I expect some politician spanking going on over the weekend, when the main focus of the media will be elsewhere.

For Mike Lee of Utah, this weekend is the big fall conference of the Mormon Church, so he may be in Salt Lake having meetings with the church bigwigs. It's an open secret around here that the LDS Church does have tight "advisory" links to Utah politicians.

Yeah, if US people can afford to donate to their local food banks, around now would be a good time. I believe most donations are tax deductible.

English has called me twice, homework wasn't done (call 1). Classwork wasn't getting done (call 2). Math called once, he was missing homework and never turned in one classwork.

English homework got done and I was told was fine (he made a 10!!!). Match homework got done and the classwork was excuse after excuse, then substitutes, leading up to me today telling him WHEN I DROPPED HIM OFF "go straight to Match class this morning before school starts and get the classwork done". He tells me tonight that the teacher says the 6 weeks are over and it is too late.

I am calling the English, TX History, and Math teachers tomorrow. He may need to be in afterschool tutoring for a while.

The schools are really focused on the kids learning to be responsible for their own work - a counter to the hovering parent syndrome, I think. The do not check that kids are writing assignments down. They do more stuff in class, so there is less homework. They have told the kids that they are responsible for going to teachers before or after school to make up or do work over. I get it and I should be looking at the online thing every few days I guess.

Ai yai yai. Sounds like you're going to have to ride him.

oh msbelle! Wow.

The government shutdowns (that were not over a weekend and thus incurred limited damage) was the '96 one and 3 in the 1970s. The 1970s ones were about 3 weeks each.

When this went on longer than 2 days, I figured we were in for a 3 week one this time. I'm worried that the extreme GOP don't take any of this seriously (the damage it can incur) and therefore are not really willing to raise the debt limit.

Well, emails were written to teachers, teacher webpages have been bookmarked, and the.punishment has been given. FML.

He did not manage to ever get the make-up classwork done in match class that we started a sag on over a week ago.

Not sure what a sag is, but I have a 17 year old with this issue.

He once again had no work brought home.

And this.

I made him come with me to check to parent online grade access

And this.

AND HE IS FAILING 3 CLASSES.

And this. It sucks mightily.

The schools are really focused on the kids learning to be responsible for their own work - a counter to the hovering parent syndrome, I think. The do not check that kids are writing assignments down. They do more stuff in class, so there is less homework. They have told the kids that they are responsible for going to teachers before or after school to make up or do work over. I get it and I should be looking at the online thing every few days I guess.

And this, this, this, and this.

I have told him I'm done. If he can't manage to get his work done and fails classes, I can't do a darned thing and if he has to repeat a year of high school...he made the bed.

But it is infuriating. I went to parent teacher night last week and two of those three teachers acted like there wasn't a real issue. The third teacher is a new chemistry teacher of Asian descent. And for her, the stereotypes hold true. Not that that excuses CJ not doing his work. At all. He is grounded from anything outside school and work (he teaches at the dojo).

DD and new DH behaved badly (anti-socially) at a meet-and-greet tonight. Ignored all the guests and just chatted amongst themselves. Me and a colleague walked into the kitchen and she looked at me, said "Seriously?" and I was all "Seriously?!" and then "Please tell me that was blatantly obvious that I don't even need to speak to the ED". He's aware, thank god. DD is on the ropes already, and new DH has been making blunders left and right since she began and outright insulting the staff with her superior past experiences. I think we're all getting to the point that we want old crazy boss lady back. At least she had integrity and perspective and a strong sense of teamwork. Instead of a whole lot of "es no mi yob".

Wait, what, you guys? Suzi, I don't know what stereotypes you're talking about and if they are Asian ones or new-teacher ones, and Juliebird, I don't know why you went into some kind of lazy Mexican (?) dialect, but.... Neither of those sat right with me.

Sorry, Jesse, I could have worded that better. The new teacher stereotype of not being able to control a classroom and not knowing how to redirect a kid who is boisterous. I mentioned Asian, because she herself, during our parent teacher discussion, said that she holds the kids to the "Asian sterotype" of mass amounts of work, in class and with homework and impossibly high standards.

I'm sorry my word choice overshadowed that fact that my child is failing 3 classes and I'm impossibly upset over that.