Sorry if these offended; however, few people who aren't in education realize the mammoth job teachers have. Educators care or they wouldn't work for the salaries they do. Fortunately, educators are kind and caring people but few in the general public realize the enormous handicaps that students who grow up in homes where learning isn't valued have.
Now that teachers are more and more being held accountable, it's important for this side of things to not be forgotten. I have seen some amazing teachers do amazing things with little home preparation but it bears repeating that it takes a village to raise a child.

I am also a retired teacher. Years ago one of my third grade students was struggling with reading and asked if he could stay after school to learn more. During one of the after school sessions, he told me that after I teach him something, he goes home to teach it to his dad, who never learned to read! I loved that kid, would love to know how he is doing now.
Some parents just never had the encouragement or opportunities, but want their kids to have more and I think that attitude is awesome. During the lasts few years of my career, parents seemed to be so much more involved and encouraged their kids to learn, even though they were dealing with moms having to work, single parent households, etc.

As a retired teacher, I am actually surprised at how FEW letters like this were sent to me. Nonetheless, ignorance abounds. I was once in a major chain store where my eye was drawn to a sign advertising chocolate bars for .25 (cents sign). I asked the manager if it were correct. When he assured me it was, I demanded he sell me the bars for 1/4 cent each. The next day, I posted a copy of the sign in my remedial math class without comment. Everyone saw what was funny.

I made the comment that I find these sort of posts to be offensive.

My dad is a retired teacher, my mother volunteered in literacy programs at the schools for many years. Almost all my parents friends worked in the local school system, many of my friends and former classmates are teachers.

I do recognized the good work teachers do and the challenges faced in the classroom. Teachers have fewer and fewer resources available to them.

However those challenges do not make okay to poke fun at the families of students. Nor does it make it okay to publish purported, real notes from parents to teachers.

Posts like this do nothing to promote adult literacy programs, do not encourage empathy for the parents. They create a greater gap between the teachers and parents, the school and the greater community. You are exiling the parents from that village that it takes to raise a child.

That is so funny, I had to print it to take it to the school principal.

I think you hit it right on in your last sentence. My kids had to be on their death beds before I let them stay home from school. My youngest daughter was so thoughtful she scheduled her chicken pox outbreak to coincide with spring break.

I thought some of those excuses were quite funny and some a few outlandish.

I could not agree more. These people ...all people deserve respect. Our job as educators is to reach out and give our all regardless of the circumstances. No blame games. Start with what you have been given and work with that. When you have humble pieces of fabric laid out before you,you start and move ahead to create a beautiful masterpiece. So too here. MHO

The truth is, it falls to both the parents AND the educators to get the job done for our kids. It's not an either or. Yes, there are parents who drop the ball, but I also know lots dedicated parents that did their job only to send their kids to school and not have the teacher do theirs. So parents, if your child's teacher isn't doing their job, scream away. And teacher's, if one of your student's parents haven't done theirs, have a conference with the parent, but don't let it be the child that suffers.

Oh yes! I could write a book on this topic, as I'm sure most teachers can. One of my favorite excuses of all time was concerning homework. Sometimes if a child hadn't done homework, the parent would hurriedly do it before dropping them off at school. Best part was that it was first grade, the children wrote in manuscript, and the parent did the homework in script! Another one of my favorites was if the child had no homework, I would either get a note from the parent (or the mom would drop in and say:) please excuse little ....... for having no homework done. It was my fault. We had to go to Walmart.

Yes, it is so wrong for teachers to be judged by the performance of the children. So much depends on the parents. The school system has so much to plow through before the child can learn at school. I was teaching first grade before there were even pre K and kindergarten classes. We got some kids "raw" from their homes. WE had to do things like potty train, teach them to use a fork at lunchtime, etc. I'd better step down off my soap box before I blow a gasket.