I have several friends who work or worked in schools, and they all have told me that students lack respect. They cuss out teachers on a regular basis, are insubordinate, and do not respect authority.

Teachers cannot discipline the students, either. Doing so gets them calls from angry parents, or in trouble with the administration that got said calls. The above factors cause people who want to teach to stop. It is brutal to their mental health to be disrespected constantly and be powerless to do anything about it.

I believe children are mostly reflections of their parents. If a child is not respectful, my hunch is that their parent(s) are not respectful. I’m curious to hear from parents: how do you ensure (if you do) that your children are respectful toward their teachers? How do your fellow parents do so? When I was a kid, the idea never occurred to me to be disrespectful toward teachers. I don’t think my parents ever had to tell me to be respectful toward my teachers. It came naturally, probably because I saw my parents be respectful toward my teachers. I of course saw children in my classes who weren’t, and I assume their parents were the same. I’m inclined to think something changed, though, since the disrespect sounds much more prevalent today. Or maybe I’m hearing about it more since I’m older, now.