McCallion
Quest

R-E-S-P-E-C-T- Why is respect such a hard thing to Give?

By: Sonia Krol, Editor

Respect yourself and respect others. It’s something that we’ve had drilled into our heads every since we were in kindergarten. But it seems like in recent years, we’ve forgotten this rule, especially at school. Of course we’ve all heard of bullying and how it’s bad to bully other students... yada yada, yada. What many don’t realize is that students actually bully supply teachers more often than they bully their peers.

As soon as we students find out that our regular teacher is away, we break out into chaos. It’s like we find some strange pleasure in making another person’s life difficult. Are we really that evil? Of course not, so the question remains why do we like to torture our supply teachers to their breaking points?

Students go ballistic when the teacher is away, and perhaps this is because they think that they can do whatever they want without getting in trouble. This is false to some extent. Most supply teachers are not afraid to send a student to the Responsibility Room or to give out a detention, but there are those few teachers who won’t, no matter how rude and wild the class. Maybe they’re just too nice, or maybe they feel they won't be doing a good job if they keep sending kids constantly to the responsibility room, or maybe it's because they just don’t know how to stand up to us. After all, on average there are 25-28 students in a class. On a supply day, this can mean 25-28 wild teenagers. If all those  individuals decide to gang up on one teacher, it can be pretty traumatic for them.

If that’s not bad enough, some teachers are new to this country, and therefore some may have an accent when speaking English. Of course, there are always those few individuals in a class that decide to make fun of the poor teacher, and start to imitate the way they pronounce certain words. But think of it this way, in today's Canada, with their tighter immigration laws, it’s hard enough to get a job here when someone is at the disadvantage of being an immigrant. So when an immigrant actually manages to land a job, they shouldn’t have to deal with people making fun of them for their accent. It’s not their fault that they don’t speak English as well as we do, it’s something they can’t control.

But the bottom line is that no matter what supply teacher a class receives, whether they’re an immigrant, a strict teacher, or it’s their first time teaching at our school, it’s important that they get a level of respect. Respect is something unconditional, something that everybody should receive with no ifs, ands, or buts. Students and supply teachers both equally deserve it. They, like us (believe it or not), are human, and have feelings. If students torture them and give them hell, we’re not setting up a very good impression of our selves. We actually get mad and annoyed when adults in society, especially teachers, don’t trust us and are quick to judge. Perhaps it has something to do with our attitudes and the way we act around adults. It’s just a guess. And honestly, what do we get in the end by making another person’s life miserable? A class has their fun for one day, but once our regular teacher comes back lectures, detentions, and apology letters usually follow. So in the end, we get absolutely nothing for making someone’s life miserable, because really, the supply teacher gets the last laugh. We’re the ones that eventually get punished.

I guess the most difficult question, and the one that seems to be the hardest to answer for most kids is this...Would it really kill us to be nice to another human being? It’s not much to ask for, and it’s a small price to pay to have a smooth year. So next time we walk into class to find an absent teacher, maybe we should think before we act.