I've recently heard/read a few stories where educators' behavior surprised me - nothing outrageous, but it made me questioned why the behavior we teach and preach to students isn't extended beyond the classroom. 

The Discouraging Principal
My friend was hired as a Special Ed teacher at a respected high school a few years ago. The position opened pretty last minute. She had another job in Boston, but she wanted to move to Chicago. Obviously, she took the job and felt lucky to get in such a quality district as a young teacher.

On her first day, the principal told her:

"I didn't want to hire you, but all the good teachers already had jobs."

Would you ever tell a student: "I didn't want you in my class, but all the good students were already taken"?

The principal is supposed to be leading and mentoring teachers, not setting them up for failure. First of all, how dare you talk to anyone with such disrespect? Regardless of how happy she was to have my friend (who has subsequently done incredibly well, gotten rave reviews and now works under a new principal who supports her) on staff, she was hired and that wasn't changing.

Secondly, you're not doing yourself, her or ESPECIALLY the students any favors with that attitude. If you want a young teacher to be successful, you help her rather than discourage her.

The Disruptive Teachers
Teacher Magazine just posted a story about the biggest complaint teachers have about professional development events: misbehaving, disruptive teachers.

One teacher said:

“I attended a workshop where the presenters asked for the sidebar conversations to stop while they were presenting. The following week I attended another workshop where these same presenters were now participants, and they were not only having sidebar conversations but were incredibly disruptive. They were so loud we could not hear. Obviously this is a characteristic of teachers in general. What do we do about it? We've mentioned calling teachers to the carpet, anything else?”
  

How ironic is that? Teachers who fight for attention day after day and try to command the respect of their students don't show that same respect to a presenter.

Have you experienced educators behaving badly? Share your story in the comments section!