All teachers are in an abusive relationship
They say “experience is the best teacher.”
The Four pillars of abuse
According to The Mend Project, there are four pillars of abuse:
- Faulty belief system
- Image management
- Entitlement
- Preferential treatment (lack of accountability)
I thought my working conditions were normal
Just before my last year of teaching, I thought all I’d experienced was how work-life was supposed to be. Until my last year, I was the teacher admin didn’t have to worry about, and my students rarely went to the office, if ever.
My students knew they could count on me to fully support their academic and behavioral needs—even if the results of those efforts fell far short of passing and even if those needs were extreme.
They knew they could come to me if other teachers didn’t get them, and they needed to self-advocate.
When I recognized problems, if they related to student behavior or academic performance in any way, I took the task of solving those problems upon myself. If a student failed, or if there was an issue in the classroom, I went into DIY fix it mode. Even if fixing it meant doing something (within the bounds of what is morally and ethically acceptable) I didn’t want to do, if it kept the peace, then I did it.
Clearly, this level of caretaking led to burn out (and to being taken advantage of), but we’re not there yet.
I wasn’t always conflict avoidant as a teacher. I wasn’t always so lenient with students that they showed little respect for the learning process, or for me. In my first few years as an educator, I very much tried to hold students responsible for the academic results of their behaviors in and out of the classroom.
Over time, I learned enlisting other adults to address problematic behaviors with students resulted in the other adults either making excuses or blaming me for the student’s negative behaviors. Students were rarely held accountable in appropriate ways, and I suffered for telling.
Preferential treatment
Once, I was told by a parent his fourth grader couldn’t have copied because he was “too young” to understand what cheating was. It was a complete coincidence his work looked identical to the internet. For the rest of the year, the parent emailed me about every project to ask for specific examples of information students were allowed to include. You know, so his son couldn’t be “accused of cheating.”
Once, I was told by a parent that I should excuse their high school daughter’s tardiness to first period because she had to use the bathroom. Their daughter would drop her stuff off about ten minutes before the bell, then ask to use the restroom, to which I’d always reply, “Yes. Be back on time.” Apparently, she’d get lost every day on the way back to my class from the bathroom right down the hall.
When I stopped asking for help
Eventually it became easier on my mental health to be quiet—to stop asking questions or for help, and to handle classroom shenanigans on my own.
Once, long before I realized I wasn’t going to get outside help, an assistant principal called me into his office to ask why I was writing so many referrals for students who’d been cussing me out.
I had recently moved, was pregnant with my first kiddo, and my husband was 400 miles away. I was teaching in a large high school in a large metroplex. In one class I had students ranging from grade nine to twelve and receiving services under one or all our district’s special populations tags: 504, Sp.Ed., or ESL.
They were also students who were extremely credit deficient and behaviorally challenged. It was my dream job.
To make learning a reality, they, and I, needed a lot of support. We weren’t getting it. I’d been asking repeatedly.
When I got the email to come up to his office, I thought he finally wanted to collaborate on a plan of action for how to help me with my students.
Imagine my surprise when he pulled out my incredibly thick file and chastised me for writing too many referrals.
He asked me what I had done to create a positive culture in my classroom, and how I could handle the students’ negative behaviors better.
Faulty belief systems
I’d spent countless hours of reading about and implementing positive behavior support systems in my classroom; hours meeting with parents, coaches, academic specialists, and students to create individualized academic and discipline plans; I’d endured months of being cussed out, talked over, stonewalled, and at times physically…I hesitate to say assaulted. I’ll say this: students should never touch a teacher without permission. Especially with an aggressive demeanor.
You can imagine my shock when my AP essentially asked me what I’d done to encourage abusive behaviors on the part of students.
He told me to write less referrals and use more positive reinforcement. He believed if I was nicer, the students would be nicer.
A sense of entitlement
I was working with 16-, 17-, and 18-year-old students who felt entitled to cuss out and bully a pregnant, adult woman when I asked them to respect a shared classroom environment or participate in class enough to meet the minimal requirements to pass.
6 years later, on a Friday, I had emergency stomach surgery. The following Monday afternoon, I was asked by administrators to upload lesson plans since students couldn’t access the online textbook assignments I’d already prepared. Something had happened with students’ account set up, so many students couldn’t log in.
When I returned, campus leaders stressed how important it was for teachers to be prepared should they have an emergency, but they never acknowledged the numerous district-level glitches that had occurred.
Eventually it became easier on my mental health to be quiet—to stop asking questions or for help, and to handle classroom shenanigans on my own.
Then my own emotional regulation started becoming a challenge, and life quickly got harder.
Image management
You know what I still feel ashamed to admit about the first year and last years at my last school? Students bullied me.
You know what’s worse? My administration knew, and not only did they do nothing about it, but they blamed me, and also asked me to continue working in the same conditions.
This environment, which should be described as toxic at best, ultimately led to me responding rather poorly to students in my last year. I was so emotionally dysregulated I couldn’t make it through the day without being triggered to an angry outburst or having an anxiety attack.
Before you ask, “Well, why didn’t you just leave?” I did, after 7 years, when I had a better than equal opportunity lined up and leaving wouldn’t bring harm to my sons by making us destitute.
Furthermore, victims of emotionally and psychologically abusive relationships often don’t know they are in one, and they feel they are the “crazy one,” so leaving can seem impossible.
If something threatens to tarnish the image so carefully crafted by district and school leaders, then punishments are often doled out in covert fashion (like when the boss tells you to be more positive but doesn’t offer real support for real problems).
Sometimes the punishment is overtly displayed while being used as a covert warning to other victims. Like when officals place teachers on administrative leave, or force them into resignation if their identity and beliefs don’t align with the beliefs of parents or district officials.
Regardless of how victims are punished, the goal of the abuser is to maintain control and power however possible. And in an institution like the public school system, this is done by using the four pillars of abuse to manipulate teachers and control the image presented to the public.
