Ahh fun with school stuff.
I had a parent threaten to sue me for giving his child an F on her project. Why? Child hadn't done anything on the project b/c out of the 10 periods allotted for doing project, child was out for 7 of them. Now, in a regular circumstance, I'd obviously give an extension, except this was May, and the project was due in February. See, when you miss 130 days and come in late for another 20 or so, it's awfully hard to get caught up. (Our school year is 187 days.) No, there were no extenuating circumstances whatsoever.
In terms of darwinism, I had a just had a colleague scream at a theatre-arts teacher for sending out a request for a student to make-up a missed musical audition during HER class period.** Screaming colleague teaches an elective study skills course-the closest my school has to study hall. Regardless of the subject though, when you teach junior high, you have to be flexible in terms of scheduling and all that stuff. It really is a three-ring circus. Anyways, screaming colleague pulled musical teacher out into the hall, in front of kids, and reamed her out. At her next break, she then stormed down to the principal to lodge a complaint against musical teacher. She proceeded to trash musical teacher and the entire theatre arts department as a waste of time.
That was until the principal informed screaming colleague that SHE had asked musical teacher to accept a late audition and suggested the skills time. She also reminded screaming colleague that there had been an email and a faculty meeting both mentioning this and the need for flexibility, and also reiterated that speaking professionally to co-workers is not optional in our district. Screaming teaching can't figure out why she keeps being passed over for open positions that she covets.
**Student was out due to a death in the family and was very upset that she had missed the audition.**