sucky teachers et...

[Kogarashi]

Oh, I forgot about how the high school scheduling office dropped the ball my senior year.

In our school, students could fill out paperwork requesting certain classes on their schedule for the following year, and then the guidance counseling office would arrange the schedules for those students to fit as many of the requested classes as possible without overflowing the class rosters. Mostly, they did fine.

The first day of my senior year, I got my schedule and noticed that, boo, I hadn't gotten the Mythology class I wanted, and double-boo, I had been placed in Public Speaking (which I hate). Triple-boo, Public Speaking was taught by a teacher with a terrible reputation in the school whose personality grated against mine (I'd had him for one study hall, and that was plenty). So I went down to the office to drop Public Speaking. I didn't really need it anyway. It counted for half the English requirement for seniors, but I was already in a full-credit AP English class, so Public Speaking was definitely optional.

I mentioned that I wanted to drop the class to the counselor who saw me (not my regular guidance counselor; my regular was cool). She responded that they'd given me that class because otherwise, I'd only get half credit with the Creative Writing class I was taking. It took me a moment to process what she'd said before I calmly pointed to the AP English class at the very top of my schedule. It even had a lab period, which made it take up a good chunk of the schedule. How did they miss that?

She stared at it for a moment before replying, "Oh. I'll get that taken care of for you."

I ended up with two study halls right in a row thanks to dropping Public Speaking, and a fair bit of annoyance two weeks in when I realized that they could've rearranged my study halls slightly and actually put me in Mythology after all.

The teacher hated me. As far as I can tell, it's because I didn't play along with her silly interpretations of books. I always hated English class because of the insane over-analysis of books, but most teachers, including the one I had for both eighth and tenth grades, realized that I understood the interpretations, I just thought they were wrong.

My husband could sympathize with you. He's a scientist, and hates English literature classes because there's no straight Yes-or-No involved. It's all subject to interpretation. I hate it when you get those teachers who won't accept any interpretation other than their own. I had one like that at University. Whenever a student voiced a dissenting opinion in class, he either refuted it outright, or twisted what the student said to end up agreeing with him anyway. At least on the final he'd still give you fair credit if you defended your own opinion sufficiently.

[Imogene]

Forgot about my high school teacher who actually made a classmate cry.
Now, this teacher wasn't high on my list anyway, seeing as he'd taken points off the first paper I did for his class for misspelling his name in the header! The f*ck?
His tests were insanely hard, to the point the class I was in routinely conferred whenever he was out of the room.
Our final was to collect, label, and press so many wildflowers.
I did mine the night before it was due, and got something like a 75%. One of my classmates had hers extremely professional-looking, and he gave her a 62%, because she mislabeled one of the flowers.
I should point out, the class? Biology, the teacher? A coach.

[froglet]

My biggest one, wasn't the teacher, as much as the secretary.
In fourth grade, last recess (thank gawd), the beginning of winter, November I think. I saw two kids in my class having a fight, the boy was just a bit shorter than me (all the kids were until 6th grade) and the girl was about a foot shorter than both of us. I got between them and I forget exactly what happened, I just know that he pushed me and as it was icy, I slipped and fell on my butt, but unfortunately, I tried to brace myself by putting my hands back.
I don't think I heard a snap or anything, I just know it hurt like a bitch after and so I went to the office to have them take care of it. I was taken across the hall to the first aid room, the secretary asked if I could move my fingers, I kinda crooked them a bit, so obviously I was fine, and I got sent back to class. Now, when it comes to external pain, I have a high threshold, I have put my hand through a window and had to look to see where the blood was coming from (two cuts, freaked my mom out, but I got stitches, still have the scars) in order to know I was hurt, and then there was this.
The direction I fell, was mostly to my left, so though I put both hands back as far as I remember, the left took the brunt of my (not so little) weight. Did I mention I'm a lefty? (Most my mother's side of the family is, my uncle got 'taught' [read: tortured] to 'write properly' like mentioned in a few of these posts, I was fortunate not to have to go through that) So the rest of the day, I was in massive pain as my hand slowly swelled to the size of a small Nerf football. While still doing the rest of the lessons, after all, the secretary said I was fine. By the time I got off the bus and home, my mom saw my hand and freaked out, and I was in the car going to the hospital in no time.
This was fun on its own, ever get x-rays of broken fingers? I may have a high tolerance to pain, but I'm not immune! Anyway, by the time the quack.. er, family doctor... got to see me with my x-rays in hand, he said I had two broken fingers, one at the knuckle, the other between the hand and the first knuckle, and they had already started to set but he couldn't do anything with all that swelling, so he told my mom to give me regular ibuprofen for the swelling and to immobilize the fingers in a tension bandage around a ball or something to provide a good shape. Few weeks of that, and the swelling was exactly the same, so then he decided to re-break and set the bones properly, on the off chance it might reduce the swelling. Then immediately put a cast on up to my elbow. Over Christmas. I had fun chopping carrots at my grandmother's house that year. And my sister got me to bag the older brother of a guy in my class, they were both jerks anyway, so I did. But thats another story all together.

Then in seventh grade, I was playing basketball, and another guy in my class went to kick the ball just as I went to grab it. Can anyone guess what came of that? If you guess another familiar sharp pain in the same hand as the above story, you get a lollipop (I still have a ton left over from halloween, so please take some...). But having learned my lesson from the first time, when I went straight to the office, I skipped the 'I hurt my hand' thing and went straight to 'I would like to call my mother' and asked her which finger exactly I had broken where last time, she wasn't sure either, and suspiciously asked why, so I told her I think I broke my finger(s) again and would she come and get me. By this time we had a new family doctor so we went to his hospital (we live equal distance from the good one and the crappy one) and after another set of painful 'just hold your hand like this! x-rays, we found out that yes, I broke one of the fingers again, my middle finger, at the middle knuckle, again. But instead of a full-arm cast, I got a finger toad. Which, since I still had to do my assignments (this was before classes had computers in them, hell, I was still using a Tandy Coco 3 at home), so I actually wore one out having to try and write and eventually taking it off repeatedly. Sure that didn't help it heal.
Not sure which break caused it, or if it was always like that, but my left middle finger curves at a slight angle away from my thumb. Not to mention it hurts in bad weather.

Then there was my fifth grade teacher. I had trouble with him. Not sure if it was his teaching style, or that the boy I liked and his friends were a bit of a rebel bunch and acted up in his class, and got things thrown at them. In hindsight, it was their own fault, they were idiots, but the thing that I hated most, and affected me personally, was his math section (other than music and gym, we had the same teacher and sat in the same class, maybe french too, I forget now). The problem came with long-division. Several of us didn't quite get it right away, I think I was away for the first day of the lesson as well, which added to my problems, but it was how he dealt with us that didn't get it that makes me think he was a sucky teacher and still bitter:
He didn't.
He took the rest of the class on with the lessons, and left those that didn't quite get it to go over the lesson again until they got it, without any help after he said he would get back to us. I still don't really know how to do long division, but I think I get the gist of it from the actual good teachers I've had since.
There were a lot of little things about that grade I don't like to this day (why take off the e to add ed, just add d!). Don't think he soured me on learning in general, but I don't recall most of what I did learn that year I think I subconsciously melded it all into the rest of the classes to get me through it.

Ok, this is long enough just from the finger thing. Good night!

Oh, and I still want to hiss when I see that secretary, she had switched to the other school in town by the second finger incident, but I was not taking any chances.

[draftermatt]

Kogarashi's story about the Scheduling senior year reminded me.

As I said I was on work release most of senior year. I went to the 1st class (semester 1, World History, Semester 2, British Literature) and then I went to work.

Start of the 2nd semester I get my schedule where it has me going to Brit Lit, and then nothing. No "Work Release" no nothing. It says I need to come to the guidance office.

So I do. And I tell them that I'm in the "Career Connections" program, and I'm going to work after 1st period.

"No you're not, you're coming right here so we can figure this out"
"No, I'm going to work"
"Is work more important than school?"
"When the school acts like this yes, yes it is. Not to mention what if the coordinator comes and sees that I'm not at work? Then I'm in trouble"

So I went to work, and called my Career Connections coordinator (who was based out of another school)

He informs me it's all been taken care of, since he sent them an e-mail about this months ago, and he just that day for the "read reciept" back, so don't worry about it.

Oddly enough my schedule for the rest of my time in Highschool had me nowhere after 1st period, but my report cards always said I was in the program.

[wagegoth]

If you guessed not in the brown-nosers you get a pumpkin pie.

I like mine spicy with whipped cream, please.


It's interesting reading all these stories. We usually figure that SCs occur at a rate of between 1% and 10% of the general population. However, I would figure that poor and bad teachers occur at a much higher rate, possibly 20% or more. I guess, "Those who can, do; those who cannot, teach," is accurate.

[Primer]

Thankfully in 10th grade, I got a different accounting teacher and my grades went from an E to a C. However, to this day, I still do not know the difference between a debit and a credit, thanks to this idiot.

Debits are left-hand entries, and Credits are right-hand entries. Nothing else.

Now if you want to know the difference between Assets, Liabilities, and Equity, and which type of entry is "normal" for each, that's another matter.

I hate it when you get those teachers who won't accept any interpretation other than their own. I had one like that at University. At least on the final he'd still give you fair credit if you defended your own opinion sufficiently.

I had several instructors that if your interpretation did not agree with theirs, then you were WRONG! I'm always open to my students using alternative methods. There is very little that I am picky about, and it is well advertised when there is something.

[iradney]

Debits are left-hand entries, and Credits are right-hand entries. Nothing else.

Yeah, but what do they mean??

[scruff]

Yeah, but what do they mean??

credit is money coming in and debit is money going out?

[Kheldarson]

It's interesting reading all these stories. We usually figure that SCs occur at a rate of between 1% and 10% of the general population. However, I would figure that poor and bad teachers occur at a much higher rate, possibly 20% or more. I guess, "Those who can, do; those who cannot, teach," is accurate.

Hey...that's not fair. I can do, but I'd still rather teach. I like teaching. And there's a number of my classmates who feel the same way. Yes, you might end up with one or two teachers in the public school system--especially older ones--who can fit that statement, but that's only one or two out of your particular school system. Which means out of how many personnel?

I can go through and tell you my bad teachers...but I can also tell you the names of the teachers who changed my life. Personally, I'd rather think about what those teachers taught me than what the others didn't. Because not only could they not do, they couldn't teach either.

[Irving Patrick Freleigh]

Oops, almost forgot this teacher from 7th grade.

I was (very very briefly) enrolled in a class called Communication Technology or some such thing. It was just called Comm Tech. I signed up for it because it sounded interesting.

Got to class on the first day and found it was nothing more than a repository for all the slackers, troublemakers and bullies from the 8th and 9th grades. I only recognized a couple other 7th graders in the class.

They all took one look at the bookish, scrawny, Coke-bottle glasses-wearing kid walking through the door (me) and figured I was fresh meat to tease and torment, so I had lots of insults, smart remarks, spitballs and other projectiles aimed my way.

I tried to ignore them, but as we all know ignoring bullies doesn't work, so I started slinging insults right back, and went home that first day with an aching jaw from it being socked pretty good.

At this point I should probably mention the teacher would yell at the bullies every so often, but it was clear it couldn't get them to stop or really wasn't trying to.

Second day was no better, so I told my parents and they called the school. They promised to speak to the teacher and resolve things.

Third day I'm absorbing more abuse, and the teacher decides that to really drive his point home, it would be a good idea to tell the entire class my parents called him yesterday complaining about what they were doing to me.

Thanks for painting a big ol' target on my back, teach!

The guy next to me, the same one who hit me in the jaw the first day, then snarled at me "I have a lot of guns at home. It would be nothing for me to bring one in and kill you."

And being as this was several years before Columbine, he was probably right. So as to not wind up as one of the first victims of the rash of school shootings that went on in the 90s, I dropped that class and took German instead. Strange thing is, I didn't get any shit from the students in that class anymore after I left.

It turned out my dad had that same teacher for a class in junior high or high school. He called him the "nutless wonder."

As for Mr. I'm Gonna Shoot You, he joined the military after he graduated high school. I can neither confirm or deny the rumors he ended up at Abu Ghirab or in Blackwater.

[purplecat41877]

I still do not know the difference between a debit and a credit, thanks to this idiot.

Debits are left-hand entries, and Credits are right-hand entries. Nothing else.

Yeah, but what do they mean??

Debit is when you receive money. Credit is when you spend money.

[JoitheArtist]

Debit is when you receive money. Credit is when you spend money.

Other way around.

[Pedersen]

Debit is when you receive money. Credit is when you spend money.

Warning: Completely off-topic bit ahead.

Actually, not quite 100% true.

To get a full feel for what this means, I point you to the book "The Accounting Game: Basic Accounting Fresh From The Lemonade Stand" which takes you, step by step, through accounting, helping you understand what's going on. I really enjoyed it myself.

What people have said about debits and credits is true, to a point.

Accounting follows what's called "double entry accounting". In this type of accounting, you track your accounts, and the accounts of the companies that interact with you. For instance, you'll track your cash account, and you'll track the account for your supplier of widgets so you know how much you owe.

When tracking your own accounts, debits increase the balance on an account, and credits decrease the balance on an account.

When tracking other accounts, such as the account of moneys owed/paid to your widget supplier, the exact opposite is true: debits decrease the balance of the accounts, and credits increase the balance of the account.

To use a semi-real-world example, let's track two accounts through a couple transactions: Cash on hand (COH) and Money Owed To WidgetCo (MOTW).

• COH starts with $100, and MOTW starts at 0.
• Order is placed to WidgetCo for $50. Credit MOTW $50. MOTW balance is now $50.
• Product received from WidgetCo. Send payment. COH credited $50, MOTW debited $50. COH balance is $50, and MOTW balance is $0.
• Some product defective. Demand partial refund of $10. Debit MOTW $10. Balances: COH=$50, MOTW=-$10
• WidgetCo sends refund of $10. Debit COH $10, and credit MOTW $10. Balances: COH=$60, MOTW=$0.

Debits always work in the favor of the person/company whose records are being maintained, and credits always work against, but what they do to an account balance depends on the type of account being maintained.

It's a woefully incomplete sample, but hopefully it helps a little bit.

Now back to your regularly scheduled thread.

[smileyeagle1021]

Debit is when you receive money. Credit is when you spend money.

Other way around.

Pedersen gave a really detailed answer... I'll do a shorter english version
Debit accounts go up with a debit and down with a credit and credit accounts go up with a credit and down with a debit.
And a general rule of thumb is that assets are debit accounts and liabilities are credit accounts.
It's more complicated than that, but damnit, my finals were last week and I don't want to take the time to right out a full essay on it unless I'm getting a grade for it.

[Arucard]

Forgot about the deputy principal in my primary school, who also happened to be my year 3 teacher for half of each week. He couldn't spell worth a damn. He needed a dictionary at the front of the class, and had to use it often. He also had atrocious handwriting, and was the teacher who I first learned cusive from. To this day, my handwriting is terrible, because I haven't been able to un-learn how he taught it.

He was also a real arsehole. I remember once one of my friends needed to go to the toilet rather badly, and he wouldn't let him, so my friend did what any kid in those circumstances would do. Held it for as long as he could, then pissed himself while sitting at his desk, where he then proceeded to get yelled at and humiliated, and was scarred by it for quite a while.

There is some justice in the world, however. My mum saw him earlier this year, rooting through a trash bin for bottles to recycle, to get the 10c deposit back on them.