Update: The principal himself took charge of this issue, and promises to keep an eye on it. He explained some parent of a student gave our number as a point of contact. We don’t know these people. Way to man up, Sir. I hope you succeed.
Original post continues below.
————
Midwest City, Oklahoma — The Mid-Del School district isn’t too bad as public school systems go. That means they sometimes are good enough to be considered SNAFU.
Perhaps you recognize the unofficial military jargon. SNAFU = Situation Normal, All Fouled Up. Granted, troops generally used a different world for the “F” part, but you get the picture. If things got worse, it was TARFU (Things Are Really Fouled Up). Then just before you died, you might say things were FUBAR (Fouled Up Beyond All Recognition).
Epperly Heights Grade School is at the upper limits of SNAFU, and approaching TARFU, at least from my perspective.
Perhaps you’ll forgive me for sounding petty: They are merciless about calling us. That is, they drop our phone number into their callout list, and we get these dreary cheery messages about things which have no bearing on any part of our lives. Almost daily. Our now-adult children never went there. I never visited the building. I believe I’ve ridden past it once or twice on my bicycle; that’s about as close as it gets.
But then, they call us about some family we have never met. If we can get stop them from hanging up, we can get them to realize there is a mistake and remove our number. For a week or two. Maybe a month tops. Then it starts all over again. We thought we had it solved last year, and during the summer we had silence from that quarter.
Today it began again.
We could probably think up all sorts of explanations for this, but it won’t matter. Someone keeps putting our number into a computer database. All it takes is a few seconds to tag that number as invalid. Even as far back as DOS days I knew how to do that. But no, they aren’t that competent.
I suppose it’s a good thing I’m a pacifist and patient man. But I felt at least one time I should blog about this because the next step is to go over their heads and file a formal complaint with the district.
This is a symbol of why I hate public education, and all bureaucracies as a whole. It’s part of why I surrendered my teaching certificate from this state, and refuse to ever work in public education again. But I suppose they can’t resist reminding me. They are SNAFU at their best.
More Update: I’ve been asked why it matters. Somebody consistently giving out my phone number, as it appears the same family keeps doing to several different agencies and businesses, could get us in deep trouble.
Try to imagine when a suit-happy collection agency, or heartless enforcement agency, has decided you gave some fraudster permission to use your number, so you can warn them when the heat is on, while offering deniable cover. It’s not implausible. I’ve been all too close to such things, and I don’t intend to see it happen again.
