my son, the public speaker

Last night, my older son, who is 11, gave a speech at the school board meeting. Kids from his class have been working on this for about a week. He went over to his friend's house this weekend both Saturday and Sunday for several hours and they did research and practiced. He even called his grandfather to get some research. You see, his school was built 50 years ago and the principal wanted to have a big celebration. They researched what school was like 50 years ago and are going to have a party and wanted to invite the school board. There were 8 kids all dressed in 50's styles and each gave a 2 minute speech about life in the 50's. It was really cute. There were about 50 people in the room at the board meeting, parents, grandparents, kids, all proud of their child up there giving the speeches. Then, the teacher passed out the invitations to the board members.

Then the board president spoke. I had a run in with the board president at graduation last year when he tried to take my seat. I had gotten to graduation early and wrapped a sweater around two seats. I had asked for special permission from two of the board members and the principal to sit in the front row, but the school board president wasn't there early enough to ask permission of. Since I am a teacher, I have to be a part of the ceremony and stand among the flags as the graduates walk past. When I came back to take my seat, the school board president was standing in front of my seat that still had my sweater wrapped around and on it. I asked him to move over since that was my seat. We had a huge argument in front of 2,000 people and the two other board members came running over and finally got the board president to move over. Most of the time, I am a meek and mild person, but my daughter was graduating valedictorian and I was not about to give up this seat. This man was not going to back down, because "school board members always sit in these seats". He could care less that I had special permission to sit there, or that my daughter was valedictorian or that he is an elected official.

Back to last night. After the kids gave their wonderful speeches, he opens his mouth and says, "You need to do better research. I was there, when Center Elementary opened, the day after Labor Day, 1959!" The room went silent. The kids looked at the teacher and their mouths dropped open. The parents were embarrassed. The rest of the school board members were embarrassed. The teacher said, "well, I guess we will have to come back and do this again next year." The principal came up and said, "There is a plaque on the wall that says it opened in 1958."

I wanted to get up and use the great line from Seinfeld...The jerk store called and they're running out of YOU!

I swear if I meet that man alone I'm going to .... What did he accomplish by doing that in front of those kids and all of those parents? Did it make him feel better? Probably. He is a pompous, arrogant fool. Did it make the kids feel about 2 inches tall. Absolutely. My son came home and cried. I hope he is happy. This man used to be a teacher? No wonder people think teachers get paid too much. If that is what they remember about teachers, I am embarrassed to be called one. I just hope everyone in that room remembers come election time and tells 100 of their friends about what he did to 8 kids.