Wednesday, October 22, 2008

Sometimes I wish I was a little more aggressive about calling people out. I have gotten better about it, but still am not 100% ok with knowing when something should be said in professional situations.
First off let me introduce everyone in this next story and tell you where they work:
Me: Music teacher in MSM outreach program
Boss: MSM Employee, head of educational outreach
Principal: School principal of the school where MSM students come to teach music lessons in the afternoons.
Co-teacher: My partner in teaching violin, also an MSM student teacher in the outreach program

Last week I was very upset after teaching. My boss basically made me and another teacher leave three eight year olds on the side of the street in Harlem in rush hour. She said we were costing her money and to get into the hired car. Well, earlier she had said that it was imperative that we take the children across the street to the other side of the school because the traffic was bad and the children are used to their street being closed off during school hours. This only applies when it isn't costing our boss money I guess. My co-teacher and I were appalled.
Today, we got an email from the principal of the school where we teach saying that it was imperative that we personally escort the students across the street. This email from the school principal was sent to my boss who then forwarded it to all the music teachers. The email made me furious because of the way my superior forced us to leave students because it was "costing her money."
So, this afternoon I checked my email. My co-teacher wrote an email, hit reply to all (which included our boss and the school's principal, and basically said she (my co-teacher) was interested by this email because of the events of the first week of teaching involving our boss. She basically said our boss told us to leave the kids and what did everyone think of this situation?
I wanted to write the same email but didn't know if I could or not. I am so glad someone did.

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