If I had a nickel for all of the times that I made myself out to be the victim in school to my parents when I was young… well I wouldn’t be a millionaire, but I would certainly be a “hundredaire”. Whether it was a teacher or peer issue, I was pretty good at presenting my story and eliciting a response from my mom. It was when my parents went to school for the conferences or when she would call the school that often the gig was up. That is not to say that there weren’t situations where there were some injustices, because there were definitely those, but I also learned to use those to my advantage to create doubt about what others at school may be saying. The fact was that I was able to use the threat of the injustice toward me to get her to jump. Now, at the time, I didn’t fully realize that I was doing this, but I see it clearly now. I just wanted to be off the hook and rescued from my emotions, and didn’t like the pressure I felt inside.

How often do situations like mine occur everyday in our schools? If you have followed this series from the start, you know that I have addressed the issues with the schools, now it is time to focus the lens on the parents. There are a few issues that I want to address: one is the degree to which parents jump to their children’s rescue and attack the school and two is the degree to which parents often don’t share the responsibilities for their child’s education with the school.

A Victim, A Victim, My Kingdom for a Victim

I often discuss the issue that I see our culture to be a “victim culture”, meaning that our culture feeds and is fed by people who play the victim role. We give them power, because we let victims often assume no responsibility for their behaviors. As parents, we often feel that we are being a good parent when we protect them from threats, whether they are real or perceived and/or even instigated by your child. In this way, parents feel that their job is to be their child’s rescuer, no matter what. Riding in on the white horse to vanquish the enemy can feel empowering to a parent who wants to feel important and powerful. Many parents would have a hard time admitting to wanting to feel that power, but it does happen, and it takes some courage to recognize this. The problem is when parents approach situations in the school that look like they are shooting first and then asking questions, it undermines the collaborative relationship that can help your child’s education, and sometimes even result in them becoming a target.

What I also often ask parents to look at, when it comes to problems they feel their child is having at school, is what happened when they were in school as kids? Sometimes parents are carrying their own trust issues with them, so when their kids claim that they were treated unfairly, parents are more than prepared to react, because it plays into their own history.

Another issue with parents overreacting to school issues has to do with parents’ sense of guilt. Sometimes parents feel that they are not there when their children need them. Either they are emotionally not available, and/or feel overwhelmed with the demands of life, job, family…, and when they feel that they have not been able to keep their kids safe from “harm”, it can bring out the mama or papa bear in them. While guilt lets us know when we have done something to someone else we need to fix, guilt can also result in us focusing our desire to protect ourselves and those we feel responsible for in the wrong direction with anger and rage.

Teaching Is Your Job

The second issue has to do with the degree to which many parents seem to feel that it is the school’s job to teach their kids. It is true that the expertise of the school faculty is to help provide your child with an education. It is also your job to support that end. One of the biggest challenges is that many parents do not feel skilled at educating their kids, and many times the techniques or ways that their kids are being taught can be difficult for parents to understand at teach at home. For many people when they feel inadequacy or failure, they would often rather not play the game instead of playing the game and losing. Parents are people too, and if we all look honestly at this, this could be part of the motivation why we may not be more involved in our kids’ education. If we are going to model more productive behaviors to our kids, we have to be willing to face our emotions, and even ask for help on how we can understand what are kids are learning. Also, be willing to feel happy that your kids are learning possibly more than you did, because that may open up more opportunities for them.

One of the tendencies of people when we feel failure is also to blame others so that we are off the hook for our emotions (remember the victim wants to be off the hook). This is often why we want to blame the teachers, the school books, the system… Aren’t we then playing the victim? But who is going to rescue our kids, and what are we teaching them. Who inspires your children more than you? You can inspire them to want to be better people, or you can inspire them to believe that they when things get tough, it is someone else’s fault. How much do we see the latter in our culture?

The entitlement that I see from many parents when it comes to their children’s education is not based in a right to demand that the school teach your kids, it comes from a dependency on others to deal with things that they don’t want to and an arrogance that they should be off the hook. Your kids see this and learn from this. As I have said before, “Your kids are always watching.” Know and realize that partnerships often result in better outcomes. No one can win a team sport by themselves. Your child’s education takes a team to win. Become a part of it.

I would like you to consider taking my pledge. Repeat after me (well, you know what I mean). “I, (State your name), love my child enough to make sure that they get the best education that I can help them to receive. It is my hope that they one day will know more than I do, and that I will be the wind that fills their sails to propel them where they want to go to help them grow. I will do my best to advance their education not only in school, but in life. I acknowledge that I am always learning and my child will always be learning. Life is full of opportunities and I will seek to embrace them openly for and with my child.”

Respectfully,