Hi, kids! I’m here to talk to your class about teachers because they’re important people to … HEY! SHUT UP AND LISTEN!
I’m not a teacher, so I can say that. So no talking, eyes front, iPhones on vibrate, safety on all weapons.
Teachers change your life, kids. They help burst the protective bubble that parents have been building around you in the hope that you would never discover drugs, Darwin or Megan Fox.
Yet some of you give teachers a hard time and … hey! No cheering!
This is what I mean. Teachers enter the profession filled with idealism but leave the classroom cynical and dispirited — usually by lunch hour.
One in three Canadian teachers leaves the profession after five years. I said NO CHEERING! Most get jobs in more relaxing professions, such as bomb disarmament. “I snip the wires and can feel my self unwind,” one former teacher said.
No one cares about teachers, kids — not even adults. A teacher can be in the news because a deranged student bit off his nose, and all the adults watching will think, “Wish I got summers off.”
Many teachers have cracked. Unfortunately for you, I have the solution. The problem is teachers have been treating you as allies.
Meanwhile, you ripped up the teacher-student contract, made it into spitballs, and fired them through the Empty Pen Casing of Disrespect.
Well, your reign of terror is over.
See, I remember which teachers got respect. It wasn’t the nice ones who wanted to help. Those teachers crumbled like the Wagon Wheels in my packed lunch.
No, the teachers in control were the ones who had an aura of menace: Dr. Dunn, whose title stirred up dread; Mr. Comeau, whose possibly apocryphal history of teenage knife fights awed us all; and Mr. Smith, whose unblinking eyes said, “You cannot comprehend how little I think of you.”
The thing is, none of these teachers did anything threatening. They barely raised their voices. But there was always the fear of … well, we weren’t sure, but we knew it would be a Bad Thing.
So get ready, students. I’ll be sharing this secret with teachers and they’ll be spreading rumours about themselves nationwide. Principal Peterson? He has a punishment called “The Belt Buckle of Death.” Miss McIntyre? Out on parole. And don’t get Mr. Banner angry. You won’t like him if he’s angry.
Teachers will regain control, and they’ll be able to get back to what they do best: pushing you up a grade regardless of merit.
Now, class, let’s open our books to Megan Fox …
