Really... I just need to vent...

[Irulan]

Wow - I really like this concept - a lot. This has a broad application. Thanks.

Heh, I got it from the mom of (another) strong willed child.

[maillotpois]

Heh, I got it from the mom of (another) strong willed child.

Ah. I have a lot of those hills. Thanks.

[lph]

Hmm. I appreciate the sentiment. But personally, I don't like talking on the phone, I value my free time very highly and my sleep even more, my house is my space, and if I were to receive work-related calls at home in the evening it had better damn well be an emergency.

So for me, I guess this could be the hill I was willing to die on

Seriously, I would probably get another phone number, and turn off the "work" phone when I went to bed.

[redrhodie]

I feel for you, V. My stepmother loves to call around 10 pm on Fridays, when I wake up at 5 am Sat. Drives me crazy. I've asked her not to call then, but that hasn't worked.

I turn off my ringer, but I'm old school, and have an actual answering machine on the land line for call screening, so I can still hear her message. Oh, and sometimes, if I don't answer my land line, she leaves the message, "Oh, I guess you're out. I'll try you on your cell." Then she calls my cell.

These kind of annoyances can cause as much or more stress than the "bigger" things in life, so if you can't get the solution you like (for them to stop calling) you have to make a compromise, like turning off your phone. It's not the ideal solution, but compromises never are.

[Reesha]

Veronica, this fascinates me. We have an emergency call system at the school where I work and it is never used unless-- you guessed it-- there's an emergency. They test it once a year and warn staff and families of the testing via e-mail beforehand. All other news and announcements for families are sent through electronic newsletters.

It seems like overkill to me to use it weekly for BS. Like others have said, it also makes it less effective in the case of a real emergency or urgent situation. Last year we had a suspicious package left in a suspicious place so we had to dismiss the kids early... imagine if parents ignored the call because they got the calls so often? My goodness.

[Irulan]

I always filter stuff like this through this filter:
Can I control this? yes/no
OK, so then what part CAN I control?

For this situation-
Can I control the principal, the school policy, the district policy etc? Well, if the answer is yes, go for it.
A more likely "no", or not without a whole lot of hassle and stress... then, what parts I can I control
My reaction - how much of an annoyance am I going to choose this to be?
My actions - what can I do to protect myself, change my environment etc., with a minimum of stress?

Face it, not a huge percentage of the population goes to bed at 7 PM. Wouldn't the phone be getting turned off anyway? Turning it off seems way simpler to me than taking on district policy. Turning off the phone puts a person in control of incoming calls, instead of trying to stop them at the source.

I don't turn off my phone, but I do have caller ID. It's a huge peace of mind... looking at the phone and choosing to not pick it up for whatever reason, knowing that if they really want to talk to me they can leave a message.

[SadieKate]

I always filter stuff like this through this filter:
Can I control this? yes/no
OK, so then what part CAN I control?

For this situation-
Can I control the principal, the school policy, the district policy etc? Well, if the answer is yes, go for it.
A more likely "no", or not without a whole lot of hassle and stress... then, what parts I can I control
My reaction - how much of an annoyance am I going to choose this to be?
My actions - what can I do to protect myself, change my environment etc., with a minimum of stress?

Face it, not a huge percentage of the population goes to bed at 7 PM. Wouldn't the phone be getting turned off anyway? Turning it off seems way simpler to me than taking on district policy. Turning off the phone puts a person in control of incoming calls, instead of trying to stop them at the source.

I don't turn off my phone, but I do have caller ID. It's a huge peace of mind... looking at the phone and choosing to not pick it up for whatever reason, knowing that if they really want to talk to me they can leave a message.

+1

You rattled off all the major points taught in a stress relief class. For free!

And, I am sooo gonna use "Is that the hill you want to die on?"

[OakLeaf]

My HTC Android phone has the option to send certain numbers straight to voicemail.

DH's iPhone doesn't have that option, but he can create a custom ringtone out of a clip of silence, and assign that ringtone to the numbers he chooses.

We use it for spam (even with the rise of caller ID spoofing, it's surprising how many spam calls come from the same numbers), but you could just as easily set your office's that way. Even better if the automated calls come from a different number than the "live" calls do, but either way you would have voicemail you could check when you wake up.



Still ... there was just something in my local paper this morning about someone who got fired because she vented to her boyfriend about her working conditions, and the boyfriend took it upon himself to disrupt the workplace in response ...

[Veronica]

Still ... there was just something in my local paper this morning about someone who got fired because she vented to her boyfriend about her working conditions, and the boyfriend took it upon himself to disrupt the workplace in response ...

I'm not really worried about that. My student test scores are consistently the highest at my grade level and that's all that matters to management now.

Maybe I should use that to persuade him to take me off the list, "Sorry, I only have brain cells to have the students read silently or watch videos since I didn't get enough sleep last night."

Veronica

[azfiddle]

Good suggestions on the stress reduction if you can't change the situation, which may unfortunately be the case. I am not technically advanced enough to know how to set my phone up to turn off calls etc, but maybe that would also work.

I'm also a teacher and our district prides itself on a lot of technology use. They usually issued email bulletins in these situations, rather than phone calls. Fortunately, my principal and our school technology coordinator are both much more reasonable and this problem just wouldn't arise- but I am very sympathetic.

I could never keep your schedule in a million years. It is just a guess, but I think that for most people, including other teachers, parents, etc, it would seem extreme to go to bed that early in the evening, and the resistance may be partly that they can't even imagine that 7:15 is an unreasonable time to call. So they may not think it is worth it accommodate you. However, if your district is like mine, parents' voices may be listened to when yours is not, so if you could get some parents to complain, maybe that would help....


I have also heard that expression "is this the hill you want to die on?" as well as this one: "Choose your battles".

Hope you are able to resolve this! Teaching is increasingly demanding as it is- none of us need any unnecessary stress added to the job.

Sharon

[Veronica]

Well, he's calling on our land line, which does not currently have an answering machine. We're looking at that as an option.

He does have control over the list and had chosen to have everyone on it "for emergencies." It's never been used for an emergency, only for these weekly calls about attendance.

For me it's as much about his attitude toward the whole thing. He thinks it's kind of funny that he wakes me up. And he can't see the parallel between his fury over the possibility of a 1 AM call disturbing his family and my annoyance at weekly 7:15 PM calls.

I guess I should count myself lucky that this is the biggest thing I have to worry about right now.

Veronica

[7rider]

Well, he's calling on our land line, which does not currently have an answering machine. We're looking at that as an option.

He does have control over the list and had chosen to have everyone on it "for emergencies." It's never been used for an emergency, only for these weekly calls about attendance.

For me it's as much about his attitude toward the whole thing. He thinks it's kind of funny that he wakes me up. And he can't see the parallel between his fury over the possibility of a 1 AM call disturbing his family and my annoyance at weekly 7:15 PM calls.

I guess I should count myself lucky that this is the biggest thing I have to worry about right now.

Veronica

Why can't there system support 2 calling lists? A "For Emergencies" for general distribution, and a "Routine Parental Update" that only goes to those who really need to know. It's not like you have a need-to-know about being reminded about early dismissal if you don't have a child in the school who needs to be picked up.

[OakLeaf]

Well, he's calling on our land line

Does anyone else call your landline? Maybe you could just turn the ringer off permanently.

We have a spare line left over from the days of dialup internet that we kept for a number of reasons, but one of the big ones is having a number we can give out to businesses we don't want calling. There's an answering machine attached just in case (and that also lets us use that phone line to check whether the electric is on when we're not home). Anyone whose calls we would answer, we give them the cell numbers.