How can you justify this view-point?

[vacerious]

By the sounds of things, he's just trying to improve the school that his superiors placed in his charge. It's highly unlikely that he'll outright ban a student from attending a family funeral or something equally important, but, as everyone else has already stated in this thread, the principal's statement just equates to "You dead grandmother isn't holding your grades back, you are."

As for the other things, such as the business park and cricket field and et al, it sounds like he's trying to spend some recently earned grant money, and to be honest, don't sound all that bad. There's some obvious "anti-obesity" moves in there, but seeing some of these things makes me wish we had them when I was in high school.

The house system sounds especially cool. Just another excuse to go around yelling "TEN POINTS FOR GRYFFINDOR!"

 

[ShindoL Shill]

based on the lack of a violent reaction, i doubt this is scotland (also you said you're british).
which is a reasonable reaction. what a prick. he sounds like a fucking retarded head. a business park? really? (i want to take a moment to wtf this.)
my school has one and we had to be evacuated because some stupid wanker managed to ignite magnesium and burn down the whole park.
now think about that evacuation, then think about a high school fire drill. now imagine them at the same time in the same place.

He is also adding.

.An indoor cricket field
.An academy for pretty much every sport you can think off (sadly no cheese rolling)
.Making a brand new school and sports uniform compulsory to everyone who's not in sixth form
.Adding a house system, thus compeletly changing the whole staff system
.A thing where kids can make the cafeteria food.

what my school has:
-we have a big astrograss pitch
-a field because its rural scotland and theyre a dime a dozen
-our 5th/6th years HAVE to wear blazers, a brand new tie we all have to buy and we have to have braiding on the wrists
-a new house system that is utterly retarded and just makes registration harder.
-we have 'cashless catering' where we use fingerprint sensors for the ENTIRE school which we have to top up (which adds an extra queue) to REDUCE the spread of germs (because the person who thought that up has no idea how an infection transfer model works and doesnt realise one person who handles money would work better)

 

[ToastiestZombie]

based on the lack of a violent reaction, i doubt this is scotland (also you said you're british).
which is a reasonable reaction. what a prick. he sounds like a fucking retarded head. a business park? really? (i want to take a moment to wtf this.)
my school has one and we had to be evacuated because some stupid wanker managed to ignite magnesium and burn down the whole park.
now think about that evacuation, then think about a high school fire drill. now imagine them at the same time in the same place.

Yeh, if he did that in Scotland, he'd probably be on fire right now.

I'm curious though, what exactly do you mean by "business people"? I'm just wondering if I'm getting this right as I'm thinking this means he's gone and replaced most of the experienced teaching staff with figures from business that may not have any teaching experience.

With this, and his plan to build a business park (whatever that may be), it sounds like this guy might be better off running a business as opposed to being head of a school.

It's been a while since I've been in school, but I just couldn't imagine any of the teachers in my school, regardless of their authority level, getting away with saying something like that in front of the whole school.

He has had some experience in schools, he was a head in another school, went in, improved the exam results, got a LOT of money to fund stupid things like the business park, then left. This seems to be the same with this school, he's only really in it for the money. As for him hiring business people, that is technically true, for the head of houses he hired a business teacher and two other people who nobody knows and have no experience in the school.

 

[Scarim Coral]

I think he could had said it wrong (or he's just a jerk full time) to get this point across.
As for wheather this is justify or not it is totally justify within reason.s I mean I know a friend who got upset easily when someone close to her had died (I couldn't bring myself to ask who it was) back in High School. I understand the need for mourning but not for too long that it had badly affected your grades (if it was like seveal months later).

 

[Sizzle Montyjing]

Do me a favour and shove a brick up his arse would you?
Jesus what a prick.
You can't justify that view point, he's a souless monster and deserves to be shot.
I agree with 'you shouldn't dwell' but this just seems cold.

 

[GothmogII]

Just a thought but...what was the context in relation to that line? Have there been many deaths in the families of students, or at the very least, a recent death that he was referring to? Seems kind of an odd thing to state out of no-where...

 

[NinjaDeathSlap]

Grr... I hate to be THAT guy that justifies it, but here goes.

Crying over your loss isn't going to fix anything. The best thing you can do is to move on. Life goes on.

I think that's the underlying point.

I agree that this was probably his underlying point.

Although that could easily be countered with...

"Yeah, because suppressing all your natural human emotions in order to meet other peoples expectations of you is such a better idea. I can totally never see that backfiring."

So yeah either he's a bastard or just plain stupid. Not something you want in a headmaster.

 

[Dreiko_v1legacy]

Uhh, it's common sense really. Just because something bad happened to you it doesn't mean you should start destroying your life even worse. Think how your dead family members would feel if they knew that because they're not there any more you started failing school, wouldn't they be very sad and guilty? You need to honor the memory of those that have died through honoring their will and I'm sure every family member would not want their offspring failing school.

 

[Verlander]

He's not wrong in his belief, but he's very wrong in his execution and it's not his place to say such things. Call me old fashioned, but headmasters should stick to the business side of things and let year heads do the hands on stuff

 

[gallaetha_matt]

What was the context of him saying this? Did the new head just blurt out this horrible rant or did actually ask him 'but sir, what do I do if a family member dies?'

To me it sounds like he's coming into this new teaching gig in an attempt to boost exam results rather than improve the quality of education. This seems to be happening in schools all over the country, but this dude seems to be especially douchey about it.

EDT: I cannot seem to handle my grammar today.

 

[ToastiestZombie]

Just a thought but...what was the context in relation to that line? Have there been many deaths in the families of students, or at the very least, a recent death that he was referring to? Seems kind of an odd thing to state out of no-where...

At the start of the year, he made a big speech to all the school (the year groups were separate due to space) and whilst he was talking about manners, behavior and all that stuff he said this. The worst thing is he had just sent out a girl who had just lost both of her brothers in a car accident out, saying she had terrible manners and will never have a good life when she was gone. Also, he said to everyone in the room that they are lesser humans because youre young, thats why you cant vote or drive. Also, at the end he asked us if we found any of his points unreasonable, which we would've got suspended if we actually did (noone did btw)

 

[ToastiestZombie]

Go talk to him. Say you think he's an insensitive prick and that what he said pissed you off. He has every right to say what he thinks, just like you have every right to call him on it.

Thats funny, my brother did after he failed to get the role as head boy after he had specifically said that he would get it. He knew my brother was right so he became red hot angry and refused to even shake his hand at the end. But no, i'm not going to talk to him about it, it would only land me in a bad, bad position and would affect my future. Anyway, all the governors are trying to get him out of there.

 

[Sariteiya]

I had a co-worker react like that once. Another co worker had just gotten a call that her friend who'd been in a coma for several weeks had finally died, and understandably, she was devastated. There was no one available to relieve her from her shift (She was management) so she was forced to finish her shift while dealing with her grief. I told her to go to the back room and take all the time she needed, which she did. My other co-worker then frowned and said, "I understand she's upset, but she shouldn't let her emotions get in the way of doing her job." I nearly decked him. He went on to elaborate that when his grandfather died that he wasn't really that broken up about it, and got over it pretty quickly.

In hindsight, maybe he really was someone who wasn't impacted by emotion that much, (He's a pretty odd dude all around,) but his lack of empathy and sensitivity was pretty jarring to me.

 

[The Virgo]

I'm probably one of the most apathetic, uncaring, unsympathetic people you could meet and even I think he's a fucking prick ... to a point.

For most people, the loss of a relative is going to impact them ... to what extent depends on the relative and how close said person was to them. I think that there should be some leeway with these people for a certain defined duration, depending on the relative and how close the person was to them. After that time period, they should be expected to start doing better.

 

[neonsword13-ops]

"If you have lost a relative, it is not an excuse to do bad in school. I once said to my nephews after they lost their mother "just because this happened, is not your excuse to start failing in school"

That COLD. HEARTLESS. FUCK.

He lost his SISTER and he told his nephews to GET OVER IT.

I mean, losing someone is hard, but that can be stressful on people. Best of luck to you, bro.

 

[ZydrateDealer]

You can't. Kick up a fuss and get the bastard sacked. I would and it's no less than he deserves.

 

[Luke3184]

Is he also per chance a champagne Socialist? If he is I will happily hunt him down.... Yay for state education in a shit school....

No bit really I had a similar 'Business model' head master, are school went from an 80% pass rate to a 47% pass rate in a year.

And whilst his reasoning when looked at from a cold calculating view point is valid, at least to the degree you're not taking in the unhealthyness of bottling, in the real world with actual human beings it is total BS.

 

[Jumpingbean3]

He's not necessarily wrong but he sure as hell could have stood to have made his point in a less insensitive and mean-spirited way.

 

[willsham45]

How English to ask one to bottle up all your emotions and all will be fine...until the melt down.

I see where he is coming from get over it and move on...but he is doing it with the sincerity of...MANAGER looking at what is least disruptive for the community as a whole as apose to the individual needs...I would be asking for a school transfer he sounds evil...or learn his ways and become a greatest evil manager you can be.

 

[NinjaDeathSlap]

I'm sorry but I agree with your headmaster. By all means you can hate him but its true. Boo hoo someone died, grieve a few days but down drown in sorry on it. Cherish their memory and hell get back to work. That is no excuse for failing.

Of course it's not an excuse for failing, but the way he is going about the issue I reckon will actually cause more damage.

There is no set time limit on grief. The 5 stages will take however long they need to take and that will vary dramatically from person to person. Forcing someone to 'get back to work' before they are necessarily ready might be done with good intentions, but it is still putting a lot of pressure on that individual while they are still too unstable to handle it. They will bottle their emotions up in order to deal with short term tasks, but in the long term this will make them heavily depressed and resentful. This overload of emotion is what will distract them from their work, causing their grades to slip, and what's more they will probably end up directing their anger and frustration at the people closest to them, thus alienating their support system. It happened to me and I've seen it happen to several other people who for whatever reason refused to deal with their grief properly at the time.

He might have a point at it's most basic level, but not only is he a callous shit head for wording it the way he did, his methods are only going to make things worse. It was my teachers who eventually saved me from the hell I was digging myself into, but if I had been under him at the time I would probably be in a prison cell, or worse, by now.