Life at St. Columba's: Parent Night

One of the different aspects of teaching at St. Columba's is Parents Night. Traditionally back home in September we have a "Back to School" night at the high school, where parents follow their students schedules and visit all their classes.  As a teacher you give them the run-down on classroom expectations, curriculum, and answer any questions they might have. Here at St. Columba's (and I'm guessing throughout Scotland- but I don't know for sure), things are a bit different. 

There are six grade levels in high school here (at home it would mean 7th through 12th grades at one school), and each grade level gets its own Parents Night. Similar to elementary schools back home, parents sign up for appointments with the teachers and meet one-on-one. The students are encouraged to come to these meetings as well. The tricky part is that the meetings are only five minutes long, and there is no time between meetings if you have a full two-hour schedule. This is like the school day for the students, where one class ends and the next begins with the same bell. This really threw me off for the first month of school when kids would come and go in waves. I've become accustomed to having small breaks between classes to get my thoughts together, and suddenly that mini-break was gone. 

Anyway, I have had two Parents Nights already, my 5th years back in October (only one meeting), and my 3rd years (20 meetings) in November. It can be an exhausting two hours, shuffling parents in and out of your classroom and trying to cover their progress in five-minute blocks. I can appreciate having an opportunity to sit down with the individual parents, but it starts to feel like some kind of crazy speed-dating type of activity. Not that I would really know of course- honest Christa. 

Tonight I had twenty-four parent meetings for my 1st year students. Twenty-four, five minute meetings with no break. In general it went fine, and you're so busy that the two hours is up before you know it. Parent concerns are pretty much the same, with questions about study habits, behavior, and level of student work. The thing that really cracks me up though, is having parents sitting in chairs in the hallway awaiting their turn with the teacher. I felt like a nurse at the doctors office calling in the next patient- "McKenzie... Charlie McKenzie...you can come in now".  Now, only two more Parent Nights to go!