Is the teacher at fault for your child’s performance?

I was dropping a friend's child off at school early one morning.  Because I was not familiar with the environment or the people I felt a need to escort him to the door of the school.  I parked the car a block away to avoid the morning school drop-off traffic, and we started walking.   Then I see this look of shock on his face.  He is staring at this parent that is literally yelling at a teacher in front of the school.  “NO, you are going to let him retake this quiz…. MY SON does NOT get Fs,” is all you could hear as the morning crowd fell dead silent.  I was thinking Oh Sh*t, what did I volunteer for.

Then I started thinking “quiz?”  Did she say a quiz? Not even a test or a report card but a quiz.  The mother went on to scream that “I don't pay my hard earned money for Fs, what are WE going to do about this?”  At first I could not hear the teachers response, somehow she stayed calm with this irate parent in her face.  As we got closer, the teacher politely stated “Ma'am you are right it was a surprise quiz.  But it was literally the same homework they had the night before just in a different order.”  The mother responded, “he told me he did his homework.”  The teacher just looked at her, like whose the fool now?

I am sure there are other examples of parents being totally oblivious regarding their childrens' education.  Although I hated it at the time, I truly appreciate my parents forcing me to do my homework every night.  Even if they didn't know every detail of what I had to do, they sure pretended like they were still reviewing it.  Now I do that same practice with my own children.