Some would say it’s a minor thing…semantics…but I think it goes much deeper.
I’m really appalled at the trend to refer to my children as “my student” in any communication from the school. It was a subtle shift, and I’m not sure when it happened. But for a few years now every written or verbal communication is laden with references to “your student”.

Example: that crazy phone message I got yesterday. “

This is the high school calling and your student [inserted her computer generated name] was absent during 4th block today.”

Kay is not my STUDENT, she’s my CHILD! I am her MOTHER.

Does it matter? I think it does. Those of us in the adoption triad are always looking for the right ways to refer to our children, our parents, the “other” parents and extended family. We are so careful with our choice of titles. Are schools being careless when they call our children “your students” or is there more to this?

I can think of two reasons for the prevalence of referring to our children as “your students”. One is that administrators (the people who are most likely to deliver formal communications, and the most likely to set a school’s culture) generally have advanced education degrees. If you’ve spent anytime reading education journals or doing education research, the children are always referred to as “students”. (In the school’s sense they ARE students.) So, it could truly be a careless habit of calling the child by the term they read and study. But the problem I have is not that they refer to the kids as “students” (as in OUR students) but that they refer to my children as YOUR student.

The other reason for this I can see is that they just don’t know what to call our kids…and they want to keep it politically correct. The child for whom I’m concerned and communicating with the school about could be my child, my grandchild, my foster child, my niece, brother…well you get the picture. It’s a complex world and not every child has a biological parent actively involved in his/her education. Still…my children are not MY students.

Where’s the harm? I think the harm is that it dehumanizes the relationships. It’s easier to be personally removed from a child and his/her family when they refer to the children as “your student”. Here’s what I mean.

The first problem is the use of “your” instead of “our” or “my”. When I send my child to school she becomes the teacher’s student or the school’s student. To communicate that ownership, they need to use the first person pronouns of “our” or “my”. Then it gets personal;then it shows responsibility. To do otherwise is to distance themselves from the situation.

The second problem is in the subtle lessening of the parents’ role. My child is MY CHILD, and that relationship is higher on the relationship scale than being a student. It trumps the teacher/student relationship. Again, it’s subtle, but it’s there. By not calling my child what she is, school personnel can forget my importance.

Two years ago we had an awful incident with LuLu on the playground of her old school. She was confronted by a teacher who she would have likely had in the coming years if that teacher would have remained. The teacher (thinking LuLu’s teacher was too kind to her and wanting to be punitive of LuLu’s outburst behaviors) told LuLu that when she was in her class she was going to “be her mama”. It was a cultural phrase from that teacher’s vernacular. LuLu, coming from the culture of abandoned orphan, totally wigged at this threat. LuLu’s Mama Bear totally wigged too. After running the incident up the bureaucratic flagpole (but not making a lawsuit out of it – which may have been a mistake), I got this backhanded apology from the teacher:

“We had a dialogue in which I informed LuLu that I would ‘be her mom.’ This statement was in no way meant to usurp your position at home. As an African American teacher, I meant it in a very loving and affectionate way.”

There’s much wrong with this “apology”. But I want to draw your attention to where this teacher thought my position as LuLu’s mother ended…at home. This subtle reference gave me pause. Could it be that our schools really believe that our position as parents ends “at home”. Could it be that the reason OUR children are referred to as “your student” is because once they cross the school’s threshold they are no longer ours, that the prevailing attitude is that the educators really know what’s best for our kids. I’ve been up against that attitude a lot. And I’m pretty darn sure that not a single educator I know could “be her mama” any better than I can.

Semantics is a powerful (and dangerous) thing.

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