What defines a helicopter parent?

[Srmom1]

I completely agree with you sxtxbelle, a grade earned is a grade earned!

About subjective grading in English, an interesting story:

My nephew, who is now in college, had to do a paper for the statewide "Reflections" contest (even though it is a "voluntary" activity, his teacher had the class do the papers for a grade, but they would all be submitted in the contest). He turned it in, and she graded it as a D paper.

His paper was sent on with all the other papers for consideration - the judging is done at different levels by a panel of English teachers- first district, then region, then state. Well, his paper won 1st place at district, 1st place at region, and was finalist at state.

There was obviously some disparity in grading between his own teacher and the various panels of teachers who placed his paper 1st.

Since having "winners" in the Reflections Contest is a big deal in our district, with newspaper announcements and blanket emails sent out with the winners names, it might have became a bit of an issue that he had received a D on the paper.

He (not his mom) met with the counselor and the English teacher to review the grade. Her response was that, stylistically, she did not care for the paper, and that she felt that it hadn't captured the "theme" of the contest's free response. The counselor pointed out that obviously the many other teachers felt that he had captured the theme, and that "stylistic" preferences should not preclude an objective grading.

The grade was changed to an A. They could hardly have the state runner up paper being a D!

I wondered, after my sister in law related this story to me, if there might be some repercussions from this teacher, having been called out with the administration. I never heard if there was, so assume that all was well.

[UGAalum94]

I really think that people overestimate the potential repercussions of approaching teachers directly about anything. Most of us are not so thin-skinned that we're going to hold someone asking us about something against them or their kid.

On the other hand, it's hard not to be irritated by someone going over your head about something that should really be your decision. Good principals don't play that anyway.

With the essay contest deal, trying to give clear guidelines for how something will be graded is always important. It seems to me that if the point of requiring the essay was to enter the contest, the grade should have come from the contest guidelines, so it shouldn't be that far off the mark. I will say though, I don't know who judged the particular contest and sometimes, it's not English teachers [ETA: I don't mean to second guess what was posted. I can see now you said it was English teachers. I believe you.]

I've seen winning essays for local stuff that were pretty much internet forward glurge, when what I'd expect from an advanced student would be better than that. Of course, I'm not claiming that's the case here. I'm just saying that many English teachers would give Hallmark bad marks for being trite, and yet, that junk sells like hotcakes.