Sub Horror Stories

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Home : 2005 : March : 14

Sub Horror Stories
By Stephanie

I teach in special ed, so these are a little different:

1. While teaching in an inclusion program, I had the pleasure of teaching the daughter of the head of our local disabilities advocacy group. Our program was the
top one in the state and this woman and her husband had sold their house and business to be able to move to our district and enroll their child in an inclusion class. We had only had the child for about 3 months and the parents were still more than a little nervous and picky. The sub decided that she didn't like the way our school did things, pulled the child out of her regular class to

do heaven only knows what in my office, and changed all of the child's homework assignments so that the child wouldn't be "getting away with being so lazy while I'm here." That was the last time she was hired to sub for a sped teacher.

The next week she subbed for one of our third grade teachers. She thought the teacher's desk was messy, so she cleaned it. Threw away every single child's portfolio with language and math tests and work samples that had been collected every grading period from the beginning of PK and the children's cummulative reading and math test summary cards for our testing program. Thankfully we had the best custodians in the world! They saw what was in the trash and decided to go check with the principal before actually throwing it out. They were our heroes! The sub was out!

2. I now teach self-contained severe/profound. I had a sub that really wanted to come into my class, so I let her. She spent the day running around dodging the kids, squealing "EWW! Don't let him touch me!" whenever my deaf-blind child got near her.

Another sub left for her lunch break and never came back.

My favorite (seriously) was the one who spent most of the day in the adjacent bathroom throwing up. I wish she would have just asked the principal to get someone else, but you have to admire someone who tried so hard to live up to her committment. By mutual agreement she never came back to my severe/profound class, but I recommended her to many regular ed teachers in several schools. She stayed booked for most of the rest of the year.

Bear in mind, these people all new ahead of time exactly what type of class this was and the aides did all of the lifting, hygiene procedures, health procedures, etc. All they really had to do was sit their quietly if they didn't want to interact with the kids.

3. When I was in high school my friend's mom would sub for us a lot. Didn't matter what the teacher put in the lesson plans -- Ms. G. would assign some type of independent busy work and demand total silence. Then, she would put this huge cassette recorder on the desk and turn it on. Any sound whatsoever (including questions) resulted in a very loud, very long verbal lashing which she would then play back to our parents! We really hated her!