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Child Item

Unreasonable school rules

The Singing Beard

What were the most unreasonable school rules you can remember from your school-going days?

I was in secondary school from 2003 to 2008, (inclusive).

In my school, the front door was for staff and visitors only, if a teacher caught you going in this door, you had to go back out the front door, around the school and in the back or side door.

Drinking was completely forbidden in classrooms. If you even took a sip from your water bottle in class, the bottle would be seized and not returned until the end of the day.

Wearing any coats other than the €80 school coat was forbidden. If you were even seen by staff on the way to school with it on, they'd find you and take it from you. If if was a cold day, tough.

If you were between classes and had to send a text message some teachers would slither like a serpent and take the phone from you. Even if you were not in a class.

If you were late to school (even if it was the school bus drivers fault / traffic) you still got detention.

Was my school abnormally fascist or did anyone else have similar experiences? It wasn't a Christian Brothers School btw.

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miss no stars

jimgoose wrote: »

I repeated the Leaving Cert when I was 18, doing just three subjects. I was working for my dad maintaining bulldozers and such, and driving an automatic 2.8l Mk. II Granada. I had no trouble getting up at 7am for work, but fitting in the school horsepuckey was a bit trying some days, especially when some dickwad would try to pull me up over leaving the school grounds to grab a bite of lunch. :pac::pac::pac:

Yeah, I did say "some kids" though. I'm all for treating students like human beings and especially treating 5th and 6th years as the young adults they are, as opposed to kids. But chronic lateness and how it's tolerated and laughed off in this country is something that really bugs me. It's rude - simple as. While I can respect a school not sweating the small stuff and not going mental over a student who's always on time being late once because of snow or something, tolerating tardiness just perpetuates the disrespectful trend to be constantly running late. Always set 2 alarms. If you sleep through your alarms on occasion, go to bed earlier. If you still seep through it, set 3 or even 4 alarms. Loud alarms. There's no excuse for sleeping it in. In schools it's disruptive and unfair on those who bothered to be on time. There was one girl in my class who was late every single day all through first year, always with the same excuse of "the first bus was full so I had to wait on the next one". Eventually one of the teachers snapped at her and said "look, that's the same excuse you use every day. You can't get the first bus, the whole class knows that the bus is full by the time it gets to your stop, this shouldn't be news to you every morning. Find another way of getting here and be here on time or I'll give you a special detention instead of a late detention" (Late detentions were sitting with the vice principal over lunch :P)

[Deleted User]

DazMarz wrote: »

Sharing razors between people is a great way to spread blood-borne diseases (such as AIDS). Fúcking idiots for having a "communal" razor. Fúcking hell.

Fair play to you for not using it!

I did point out that Aids and the like could be transferred between people using the razor and was told to cop on. How anyone could take a razor used by who knows how many others and shave with it is beyond me. It's just disgusting and the enforcement of it felt to me like a power trip by the manager. If they gave each person a new disposable razor then maybe it wouldn't be too bad but that they thought it acceptable to share the same cheap, disposable was just wrong.

jimgoose

Deleted User wrote: »

I did point out that Aids and the like could be transferred between people using the razor and was told to cop on. How anyone could take a razor used by who knows how many others and shave with it is beyond me. It's just disgusting and the enforcement of it felt to me like a power trip by the manager. If they gave each person a new disposable razor then maybe it wouldn't be too bad but that they thought it acceptable to share the same cheap, disposable was just wrong.

This is absolutely amazing. Do people actually put up with this sort of thing? :eek:

[Deleted User]

jimgoose wrote: »

This is absolutely amazing. Do people actually put up with this sort of thing? :eek:

Some people have no backbone and an inbred need to do as told. I always believed that many of the rules enforced in schools were in place so as to make people as subservient as possible for when they entered the real world.

jimgoose

miss no stars wrote: »

Yeah, I did say "some kids" though. I'm all for treating students like human beings and especially treating 5th and 6th years as the young adults they are, as opposed to kids. But chronic lateness and how it's tolerated and laughed off in this country is something that really bugs me. It's rude - simple as. While I can respect a school not sweating the small stuff and not going mental over a student who's always on time being late once because of snow or something, tolerating tardiness just perpetuates the disrespectful trend to be constantly running late. Always set 2 alarms. If you sleep through your alarms on occasion, go to bed earlier. If you still seep through it, set 3 or even 4 alarms. Loud alarms. There's no excuse for sleeping it in. In schools it's disruptive and unfair on those who bothered to be on time. There was one girl in my class who was late every single day all through first year, always with the same excuse of "the first bus was full so I had to wait on the next one". Eventually one of the teachers snapped at her and said "look, that's the same excuse you use every day. You can't get the first bus, the whole class knows that the bus is full by the time it gets to your stop, this shouldn't be news to you every morning. Find another way of getting here and be here on time or I'll give you a special detention instead of a late detention" (Late detentions were sitting with the vice principal over lunch :P)

The amount of idjit teachers coming howling into the car-park ten minutes late looking rather dishevelled on the average morning always amused me somewhat. I'm never late.

miss no stars

jimgoose wrote: »

The amount of idjit teachers coming howling into the car-park ten minutes late looking rather dishevelled on the average morning always amused me somewhat.

Probably let away with lateness in school :P

Aglomerado

jimgoose wrote: »

I wonder if any youngster has ever just "exploded" in a tsunami of scour around the desk? What is the official policy in that situation?? :pac:

That actually happened in my school. The poor lad had Spina Bifida and one of the symptoms of that condition is weak bladder / bowel control.

jimgoose

miss no stars wrote: »

Probably let away with lateness in school :P

Or, more likely, missed out on my dad's Gunnery Sgt. Hartman routine at 0715 every morning.

NormalBob Ubiquitypants

I drove to school for some of 5th and all of 6th year. Beginning of 6th year I got called into the principal's office over my attitude in school. Literally the second day in September at this point. He said he had a "few choice words" for me and proceeded to rant at me for 10 mins, the vice for the same before I finally found out the problem. I had reversed into a car parking spot so the car was pointed out towards the exit. This showed my unwillingness to be there and my eagerness to leave. Seriously. I thought I was being practical.
At the debs I had a few choice words for them, mostly involving 4 and 5 letter words.

jimgoose

Aglomerado wrote: »

That actually happened in my school. The poor lad had Spina Bifida and one of the symptoms of that condition is weak bladder / bowel control.

Yeah. And I suppose some nutter wouldn't let the poor child go to the bathroom?

Aglomerado

jimgoose wrote: »

Yeah. And I suppose some nutter wouldn't let the poor child go to the bathroom?

It's possible. I wasn't in the class with the boy at the time but I was in the next group to use that room, so I witnessed the result.

FloatingVoter

jimgoose wrote: »

Yeah. And I suppose some nutter wouldn't let the poor child go to the bathroom?

As regard toilet rules, some teachers were better suited to being concentration camp guards. Along with the usual morons, there were and probably still are sadists.

ronjo

Some crazy stories here.

Any teachers like to offer stories as to rules in their schools and whether they agree with them or not?

FloatingVoter

ronjo wrote: »

Some crazy stories here.

Any teachers like to offer stories as to rules in their schools and whether they agree with them or not?

Watch for anyone posting as a guest. That'll be the gang from Teaching & Lecturing in to let off steam.

Stepping Stone

jimgoose wrote: »

I wonder if any youngster has ever just "exploded" in a tsunami of scour around the desk? What is the official policy in that situation?? :pac:

One of my friends is a teacher. She was telling us that you know your students, you know the messers and you know the ones who ask to go to the toilet all the time. If someone who doesn't normally go asks (normally they look uncomfortable too), then you let them go. It happens rarely, part and parcel of being a good teacher.

Anyway, they had a HDip in who was nearing the end of her placement, so she should have known better but she denied a student permission to go to the toilet repeatedly. He never normally asked, so she should have but she didn't. Anyway, he jumped up, ran out and disappeared. She tore off to the principal to report this terrible behaviour on the part of the student. Knowing that she was an idiot, the principal sent her back to class and went looking for a normally very well behaved student. HE found him in the toilets after soiling himself. They had to call in his mother, with a change of clothes, get the poor child to the showers without being seen, sent him home and had to keep it all from the HDip, because she would have told everyone. She was told instead that he had vomited all over himself because she hadn't let him go to the toilet when asked. Nothing funny in that either, but apparently she still couldn't see the issue.

Not cut out for teaching or any job where you have to use common sense according to my friend. In hindsight, it only took one idiot teacher to impose a stupid rule to make everyone's life very difficult.:rolleyes:

FloatingVoter

^ I'll lay money there isn't a principal reading this thread who doesn't have a similar tale.

Stepping Stone

FloatingVoter wrote: »

^ I'll lay money there isn't a principal reading this thread who doesn't have a similar tale.

Probably. The stories she tells are hilarious but tragic. One particularly irritating HDip told the principal straight up that he wasn't going to bother to do anymore English, because it was dry and boring. Essentially, he deserved better. What did he hold a degree in and was supposed to be teaching you may ask? English and history. He thought that he might just sit there for the rest of the year and think about another subject that he might teach. These idiots don't make it into teaching by the way. They just give it a good try until they are rumbled as being too obnoxious/ stupid to actually deal with.

FloatingVoter

Trainee teachers - oh what fun we had playing with them. Truth be told, I learned university level history from a veteran Irish teacher. And the Geography teacher covered up for the English guy's mysterious disappearances (he was in the pub).
I never had a trainee Nazi but I certainly saw a few with chronic stage fright. We used to feel sorry for them. Afterwards.

razorblunt

Trigger Happy wrote: »

This thread takes me back!

Our school trousers could not be flares (for those with Hippy parents).
But they could also not be drainpipes (for those with Mod parents).
And they could not have any decorations (for those with Punk parents).
They had to be standard cut grey slacks.(for those with Accountant parents)

Amirite?

takamichinoku

Mam was a teacher at my school so I had the special rule of having to take part in every activity but never been allowed to win any of them. Didn't really get it at the time but it makes sense, think most teachers send their children to other schools?

There was a ban on skirts of all kinds in my secondary school purely because one girl started wearing extremely short ones, was brought in within a week of her starting into that. Can't really remember much more beyond a few boys being really annoyed about the decision. That's really the only rule that sticks out.
Small schools though, I guess larger ones need more specific rules.

[Deleted User]

I'm after remembering the time when the teachers refused to monitor lunch time and others, mainly trainee teachers and farmers were brought in. One of those who got the job in my old secondary school was a failed English teacher whom had never completed his degree but ended up being kept on to tech the lower level English and monitor free classes. Like many of his ilk he had delusions of grandeur and took every opportunity presented to lord it over students.

I had him one free and as it was the third of the day I hadn't much to do and instead opted to read for the 40 or so minutes. Spent 10 blissful minutes engrossed in Less Than Zero before someone grabbed the book out of my hand and asked who the fuck did I think I was. I told him my name and was greeted with the old "don't be smart with me" retort before he tossed my book toward the bin. I'm assuming that in his mind he saw it sailing gracefully through the air and landing smack bang in the bin but being real life it instead fall off a good five foot short of the bin and three to the left. I asked im to retrieve my book and he informed me that in his class people did as he said and he never gave anyone permission to read in his class, especially not the trash I had been reading. I explained that having and abundance of frees that day I had homework down and it was the choice between taking a nap or reading and I settled on the latter.

He launched into one of those long winded speeches that some favor and included a few insults directed my way and ended it by asking why I didn't respect my betters. Much like I've told plenty of people in the years since I told him that "respect is earned." He grabbed me by jumped and started screaming that "you must respect teachers" as they were my "betters." "Fine" I replied, "I'll respect teachers but not those who fail to get their degrees and turn into lil Nazis as soon as they gain a tiny bit of power." He went ballistic, screaming and stomping around the place and seemed to get lost in his own little world so I stood up, retrieved my book and packed my bag as it was evident what was coming next.

As he finished his rant and as those around him were wiping his spit off them he trundled over to where I was sitting and grabbed my chair telling me to report to the principals office and that he would see me down there soon. I grabbed my bag and headed down to reception where I explained what had happened and was told to wait. He arrived down awhile later and just before he got there the final bell of the day rang and I figured "fuck this" and headed for the door. He shouted after me to wait but being emboldened by the past 15 minutes gave him the middle finger and headed for the best.

Next day he was waiting for me inside the school and told me "that he'd make me pay" and how I'd better say goodbye to everyone as he was having me expelled. I got called into the principal's office and the entire ordeal was dragged out and from his telling of it you'd think I had burnt down an orphanage full of children. He made a big deal of the filth I was reading and how it didn't belong in print, never mind in a school.

When I was asked what I had to say I didn't bother explaining what had happened as this was a school where no matter how right you war, if a teacher said otherwise you were wrong. Instead I told both that I was owed 11.99 for a new copy of Less Than Zero as the pages had came loose from the spine thanks to being thrown across the room. I was told to get out of the office and that I'd a months worth of detention and extra homework to look forward to. Again I thought, fuck this and informed the principal that if that was the case then I wanted to make a complaint against failed teacher for abuse given how he grabbed my by my jumper. Again I was told not to be smart and told to leave but it was the last I ever heard of it. Never did get a replacement copy of my book but I did take great enjoyment in sitting in every free class I had that he supervised reading whatever book I'd brought with me that day.

DazMarz

I remember once I was in school and I was bursting for a pee. I mean bursting. But, of course, the resident messers had all been out and back to the jacks about 10 times since the class began. I was never and out-and-out messer, but I wasn't an angel either. So, naturally, when I asked to go to the toilet, I was refused. Grand, only 20 minutes or so until the end of class... hoooooold it... hooooooooooooooold it...

Nope, not happening. I ask again. Nope. I beg this time. Nope. Heartless cúnt.

So I did what anyone else would do, just stood up and legged it to the toilet. I think it sounded something like the time Homer Simpson finally got to pee in the episode "The City Of New York Vs. Homer Simpson". Just agonised, relieved moans and sighs.

Of course, cue getting into trouble for leaving class without permission. I got detention for my very calm response: "Well, it was obey the rules or piss myself. Which would you do?"

I also went to an all-Irish secondary school, where you would get detention if caught speaking English. It was silly, because we all spoke English to each other anyway, and most teachers would play ball and translate most of the class into English anyway. It just got us a few extra points on the Leaving.

But some teachers took it upon themselves to be like the Gaeilge Gestapo. They would sneak around trying to catch you speaking English. I will never to this day know how I avoided detention for this one. Playing football at lunch one time, and a player on my team made an awful mistake. Cue "You useless motherfúcker! What the fúck are you doing? You stupid cúnt. For fúck sake. Fúcking useless..." etc. Turn around and there is the vice principal glaring out the window at me, having heard the whole lot. A sheepish smile and a pathetic wave and I ran off to play football. Amazingly, I got away with it.

The school was also very strict on being on time. However, my commute to school meant I had to go through an area with loads and loads of roadworks and so on. This was when I was in first year. I was always getting into trouble for being late, my protestations that it was not my fault due to roadworks falling on deaf ears. Finally, one teacher with a bit of cop on, wrote a note for me and a load of others who had to come from the same direction explaining that it was not our fault if we were late. The pressure eased off. Stupid, though, that these guys who are teachers (degree holders, educated and allegedly sensible) couldn't fathom getting stuck in traffic.

The school uniform rules in my school were stunningly lax. I got away with never wearing the school tie, wearing jeans, wearing runners and so on. Caught a bit of flak in the early days, but I think they gave up on me. Was class. I cannot get over how strict some places were about the uniform. My big gripe with school trousers was that they were awful, uncomfortable yokes; no protection from the cold in the winter and insufferably sweaty in the summer. So I switched to jeans which were much better. And got away with it!

In fairness, my school was very easy-going and lax. You got away with most shít that would get you detention or suspended in other places. It was never that bad. The teachers were usually fairly tuned in. But like everywhere, there are always gobshítes. We had a few prize pricks in our school, but most had enough cop on to not be totally harsh.

I think a light-touch is needed sometimes. Teachers don't seem to realise that pupils are, by and large, sadistic and hormonal little shítes. Pupils love seeing a teacher get wound up and try to go all medieval. Whereas, a teacher who has a lighter touch usually gets better respect and more control. Well, that was my experience of it anyway. We tried to make life a living hell for the strict idiots, whereas the ones who treated you like a human being were equally treated with respect.

It's a two-way street, and while yes, teachers do have advantages and all that, they need to realise that their pupils will respond better to a bit of respect and so on, rather than treating them like plebs.

DazMarz

Deleted User wrote: »

Darko sticks it to a Nazi teacher

Class!!!

EGriff

I've never heard of this €100 school jacket lark before, uniform is fair enough but a jacket/coat as well?

Is it a case of the principles brother in law owning the local drapery and having the things made in China for a fiver each?

NormalBob Ubiquitypants

EGriff wrote: »

I've never heard of this €100 school jacket lark before, uniform is fair enough but a jacket/coat as well?

Is it a case of the principles brother in law owning the local drapery and having the things made in China for a fiver each?

Drapery! Someone was in private school. :pac:

Princess Consuela Bananahammock

EGriff wrote: »

I've never heard of this €100 school jacket lark before, uniform is fair enough but a jacket/coat as well?

Is it a case of the principles brother in law owning the local drapery and having the things made in China for a fiver each?

Something along those lines is the popular opinion.

You also have said drapery stores scaremongering to the public about mass unruly behaviour being only preventable by the school forcing you to pay for expensive school uniforms that only they can provide.

If you insert the words "defense contractors" "terrorism" "government" and "drone missiles" you get the same thing on a slightly larger scale.

megadodge

Dayum wrote: »

Because the model of public schooling is built on our dated view of the Industrial Revolution. I.e - massive factories (schools) churning out products (children) on a conveyor belt having thrown every individual child (with different wants, needs, desires, interests and passions) under one group to be separated into categories based upon some abstract grading system. There have been countless studies done that clearly shows as a child progresses through public schooling his or her creativity, curiosity and individuality diminishes and eventually, inevitably disappears.

I have friends that have taught in public schools for the best part of 15 years and they can attest to the fact that the children are bored, but not as bored as the teachers. It's cruelty that we lock these kids up for 6-8 hours, 5 days a week for 18 years to learn something they have no need for in life nor something they wish to learn and then decide their life for them by telling them they're just not good enough, not smart enough, not worthy enough when they get their grades.

It's not that these kids are some sub-species of human - it's a broken, outdated system that has destroyed their hopes, dreams and desires. Why should a child on the verge of understanding decimals and fractions be told to put down that arithmetic textbook and take out their poetry book?! Why should a child with curiosity in computers be punished and roared at for scribbling in their notebook because they're bored learning about Irish?!

The Department of Education has a lot to answer for. The Organisation for Economic Co-Operation and Development has stated that a massive percentage of Irish males are functionally illiterate and we spend more time (with the exception of Israel) learning about religion in class with biology, physics, chemistry and the sciences given a backseat.

And then if you wish to see your child receive a real education, along comes the government (who apparently know better than you as a parent) to punish you for not sending your child to be indoctrinated, to be told he/she is not good enough, to kill any creativity and individuality your child has. Why is it that a child that has self-educated about the human body be told they cannot study medicine because they had no interest in history or art?

What an absolute joke.

Our education system is built, and designed, to the benefit of the unions - not the children that is, ironically, claims to help.

That there is one of the finest posts I have ever read.

You have articulated much better than I ever could exactly what I have thought since I was a teenager at school.

Thank you.

EGriff

NormalBob Ubiquitypants wrote: »

Drapery! Someone was in private school. :pac:

I was not, I went to a CBS.

I say drapery because that's the dusty old shop that sells clothes for old women and school kids.

FloatingVoter

EGriff wrote: »

I was not, I went to a CBS.

I say drapery because that's the dusty old shop that sells clothes for old women and school kids.

Yup, down the country, the drapers was the nearest to a tailors you could get. And they could do magic with cloth for half nothing. If the school got above itself and introduced crests as a moneymaking racket to pay off the principals ex-wife (:rolleyes:) the draper could fake it for you.
They're a dying breed now but you'll still find them in any midsized town.

karaokeman

Wearing uniforms.