A 61-year-old teacher in Ohio is suing her school district because the district is making her teach younger students instead of high school students. The teacher says she needs to teach high school students because she has a phobia of young children.
Having raised a child from infancy to adulthood and having been a person who went through infancy to adulthood, I have to say that most of my trauma in school life occurred in high school. Even a red block, that for one brief moment substituted as a short range missile thrown by my friend Lisa Lawrence in PS 138 in the Bronx and almost took my eye out, did not scare me as much as some of the day-to-day emotional traumas of high school. But so is not the case with this teacher.
I get that a lot of people don’t like little kids. They are messy and demanding and take up a lot of time, but this woman is so afraid of them, she refuses to face them. Unless she has taught those kids in the Stephen King story “Children of the Corn”, I have to wonder how bad could her young students be? What power do these little people hold over her?
Her lawyer has said she has deep-seeded issues with small children which probably stem from her being bullied during her grammar school years. Again, it seems to me that second and third-grade bullies are not nearly as vicious or traumatizing as the teenagers who roam the hallways of our finest high school institutions. An eight year old screaming “You have cooties!” is far less traumatic than the crap 15-year-olds dish out. But let’s give this woman the benefit of the doubt and say her lawsuit is legit and she isn’t just looking for early retirement with a full pension and a little extra cash thrown in. Even with this assumption, I still have a fundamental question to ask:
Why the hell is she a teacher? A teacher afraid of kids is like a chef afraid of the stove or a doctor afraid of blood or a writer afraid of words or a mechanic afraid of cars – well, you get my drift. How, with this fear that her lawyer labels as paralyzing, did this woman not only decide to pursue education as a career, but get through the student-teacher process and other school onsite requirements that go into earning that teaching degree? What school gave this woman a diploma?
If this woman in Ohio is so afraid of young children, I have alternate career suggestions that might make her life easier. She could be a manager of a 55+ community or a social activities director at a retirement home. She can run a porn movie house or adult video store; she can be a bartender; she can work in a casino; she can be a driving instructor – her options are almost endless.
In the meantime, I want to know how this woman makes out teaching the younger kids especially when they find out she is petrified of them. Children are like rabid dogs. Once they smell fear, they never back down.
I have a suspicion that that teacher was once a kid herself!
Considering your last line about fear, I wonder if one of the young ones has something on the teacher. Something ransomable.
Good thought Thomas! You know how these young ones are nowadays!
In many cases comparing small children to rabid dogs is an insult to rabid dogs. heh.
So true Phee! So true!
I give you the gross goo stuff but a phobia of kids? LOL
I always liked my elementary teachers that had children better than the ones that didn’t. I suspect she is not planning on having any children of her own!
Maybe she is just going to get them from a rescue!
Wow! That’s amazing! Frankly I harbor fear of young children, but mostly it’s because of all the goo that comes from their orifices.