Incidents and Allegations

I talked to the principal on Friday about the incident with Arome. She was assigned one day of In-School-Suspension on Thursday and they held her out of my class on Friday. It’s disappointing. I would think that a threat to a teacher would get more serious consequences than that. Arome’s mother showed up during the school day and demanded to talk to me. She told the principal that I had provoked Arome. The principal told her that he couldn’t interrupt my class (at least he got that right) and then interrupted my class to ask if I could meet with her after school. It didn’t seem like I had a choice so I said I would. A few minutes later, the office secretary also interrupted class. Arome’s mother couldn’t meet after school, how about first thing before school on Monday morning?
I agonized over the meeting all weekend. What was I going to say? What if she was hostile (the principal told me that she was hard to handle one-on-one)? Why wasn’t I getting more support from the principal? Does he think I’m in competent? Does he want me to work at the school?
I thought about taking Arome to court. After all, she did threaten me. The school didn’t seem to take it very seriously. One day of In-School-Suspension? She could be in jail! Maybe a court case would force the school to take these incidents more seriously.
I arrived at school early today for the meeting. The first person I saw was the principal. He was heading into another meeting. It turned out that he didn’t know anything about my meeting. It looked like I was going to have to do the conference alone. I went to my room and collected my trump card. Earlier, I had confiscated a notebook from Arome. The notebook was full of obscene and perverted things that she had written in class. I placed the notebook in my binder in case the conference got nasty. If Arome’s mother claimed that Arome was an angel and I was the problem then I could give her the notebook. It was time for the meeting. I prayed and then headed to the office. I didn’t want to meet in my classroom with nobody around.
Arome was there. So were her mother and a man. Her stepfather? Grandfather? It looked like a three-on-one. We went into the conference room together. There was an awkward moment of silence and then I started telling my story. First, I told them how I had worried about Arome all weekend and that I hoped this conference would resolve things so that she could get back to the business of being a student. I was hoping to defuse the situation a little. Then, I started a couple of weeks back. I told them about the comments that Arome was making in class. She tried to interrupt but her mother stopped her. I told the whole story and I’m sure that it sounded different coming out of my mouth than it had out of hers. Arome tried to interject comments along the way. Each time, her mother stopped her.
There was a knock at the door. The principals wanted to use the conference room for a meeting. Could we move to another room? We stood up to move. The man shook my hand, “Sorry to waste your time, Mr. Moore.” He and Arome’s mother left. Arome walked off to the cafeteria. I stood there uncertain. What had just happened?
I’m still not sure. Did they believe me? Why wasn’t there a confrontation? Why didn’t they reprimand Arome? What did it mean? My trump card was unplayed. Did I win the hand? I guess we’ll see how Arome behaves next class.