My Daughter’s NYC Public-School Teacher Supports Trump

Dear Emily,

I’m struggling with how to respond to a recent incident at my daughter’s New York City public school. When I came home from work on Wednesday, the day after the election, she rushed me at the door to tell me about what happened at school that day — not typical teenage behavior! She said her ninth-grade English teacher made all the students in the class watch Trump’s acceptance speech and take notes on “his values” and asked them to pay particular attention to how positively the crowd responded during his speech. Though the teacher didn’t say anything directly about how she voted, my daughter says she’s a known Trump supporter at the school, so I can only assume her intention was to in some way promote his ideas. When my daughter and many of the other students voiced their objections and said they found the exercise upsetting, the teacher said it was her lesson and she would teach the class the way she wanted — they had to do the assignment. One brave student got up and left the room to go to the principal’s office and was not required to go back to the class.

At 14, my daughter is old enough to be politically aware and was excited by the possibility of electing our first female president. She was extremely sad that Kamala lost. As a family, we share her views, and at the same time I’m aware that these feelings are very much her own, and we respect them. I wish the teacher had given the students the space and the time to decompress after such a divisive election no matter how the kids felt about the outcome.

I’m not totally sure how to tell my daughter that she needs to respect and listen to this teacher after she acted with so little empathy toward her own students. I’m curious about what else this teacher is teaching in her class. And I’m torn about whether I should bring this up with the school. Our daughter just started there this fall, and so far we’ve had only positive experiences. I suspect this teacher is an anomaly at the school, but I don’t know the other teachers and/or parents well enough to find out. I’m also personally exhausted from the election and don’t want to engage in more politically charged conversations with anyone. What do I do now in terms of talking to my daughter about how to tough out the rest of the year in this teacher’s class or, if I can make myself take on having the conversation, talking to the school?

—Can’t Believe I Have to Deal With This Right Now

Dear Can’t Believe,

Waking up to the news last Wednesday that Trump won the election was brutal enough already. I know that, as a parent, it was difficult for me to go through the motions, to answer my kids’ questions, and get through drop-off without bursting into tears once or twice. I’m so sorry your daughter had to deal with this added burden. From what I’ve heard from parents with school-age kids, most teachers handled the situation with appropriateness and grace. They set aside class time for kids to discuss their feelings in a nonconfrontational, nonpartisan way. It’s too bad this isn’t what happened for your daughter.

It’s also the school’s fault, and if you can find the energy to take it up with them, I think you definitely should. It doesn’t have to be immediately, and, in fact, it probably shouldn’t be. When you’ve had a chance to let your feelings metabolize — and, even better, maybe had a chance to talk to some other parents of kids in your daughter’s English class and get them to back you up — go to the administration and calmly, factually lay out exactly what you think this teacher did that was inappropriate. I’d be ready for them to counter by asking how you’d feel if Kamala Harris had won and your daughter’s English teacher had taken class time to let the students watch her victory speech. Don’t let yourself get sidetracked by the fact that this comparison isn’t just apples and oranges; it’s apples and convicted felons. Instead, calmly point out that the teacher didn’t just have the students watch the speech — she made them take notes on “his values” and drew attention to the positive crowd reaction. None of that has anything to do with teaching English. It all amounts to what I’d consider to be — and this is how I’d put it to the school’s administration — a breach of trust. Your daughter has the right to expect her English teacher to be an English teacher. Now it’s on the administration to find a way to reestablish trust between their teachers and students. The way they choose to do that is up to them.

You don’t have any control over what happens after that, but at least you’ll have done something, which always feels better than doing nothing and just seething. You’ll be able to tell your daughter you had her back in a difficult situation. And you’ll also be able to explain to her, as part of a longer and more difficult conversation, that whatever happens with the school, sometimes we have to deal with authority figures (whether teachers or presidents) who don’t share our values — or, even worse, who try to impress those values on us. When that happens, all we can do is keep our heads down and do the work, insofar as we can do that while staying true to what we believe in. If this teacher goes on to assign essays about how Trump is making America great again, for example, your daughter is within her rights to refuse to do the assignment. And, of course, if she and her fellow students are comfortable doing so, they are well within their rights to take their grievances to the administration themselves.

You didn’t expect these kinds of lessons to be on your daughter’s ninth-grade curriculum, but unfortunately they are. The great thing happening here, though, is that she knows without a doubt that she has you to help her make sense of these experiences. The fact that your daughter came home and came straight to you with this means she trusts you implicitly to guide her through difficult situations. Take a moment here to congratulate yourself on being a good parent! Then use that confidence to gather the strength and momentum you’ll need to get through the next four years.

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