Oh Yeah, I Am Alive

Sorry for the lapse in posting for a while. Didn't mean to run out on ya'll like that.

First we had our guest post April Fool's thing going, thanks to Mr. Teacher. (That Mr. Teacher, he's so silly!)

And then hubby and I went out of town for a weekend to do some Civil War battlefield touring in Georgia before spring completely sprung (you can't see earthworks much past late April due to the plant life!)

And of course Hubby's computer died and he's been using mine until we got a new one and got it set up.

So, I've been out of pocket for a bit.

And, what with dealing with the final review before our Very Big Deal Government Mandated Test next week, it's been a bit crazy.

And of course, there's always Nurse Groupie.

If this kid spent the energy she currently uses scheming for ways to visit the nurse or call home, on her school work, she'd be on the honor roll.

She survived one day without a visit to the nurse or a call to home after we implemented the plan where Mrs. Sparrow, our Assistant Principal, had to approve any such visits or calls home.

The second day she asked each of us to go to the nurse to get "personal girl things", which didn't work because we simply told her to sit down and Mrs. Sparrow would come deal with her. Which she did.

The next day she simply took herself to the nurse between classes to get her "personal girl things," and while she was there to get a baby aspirin (for who knows what.) The nurse, who usually doesn't do anything without a form filled out by a teacher, asked who gave her permission to be there, and she informed the nurse that Mr. Math did, and since she had a hallpass lanyard around her neck, the Nurse went ahead and took care of her. Only problem was she didn't ask permission, and the hallpass lanyard was really her house key on a similar colored lanyard.

Mr. Math was livid, Mrs. Sparrow even more so, and NG ended up in in-school suspension for a day. Mrs. Sparrow also called mom and informed her that it was not the school (or taxpayer's) responsibility to provide her with "personal girl things". Apparently Nurse Groupie's reasoning is that her purse is too little to carry such things so she simply wants to get them from the nurse (every class period, or every 47 minutes or so).

So today we get an email from Mom. Nurse Groupie has contacts. She also has drops with her, but mom says she's not to leave class to put the drops in. She also has some more allergies (and a new doctor appointment to get different meds) but she has a little tube of Vicks that she can rub on her nose as she's not to leave class. However, if a contact falls out, we should send her to the nurse to help her put it in as Mom doesn't want the contact lost. In other words, unless a contact comes out, She Is Not To Leave Class According to Mom.

Guess who's popping her contacts out and then wanting to go to the nurse/bathroom to put them back in every period?

Guess who now has to go to Guidance when her contact "falls" out and has to put them in under adult supervision and is then escorted promptly to class?

Yup, Nurse Groupie.

I wish, while Mom was at the doctor figuring out new allergy meds, she'd get the kid a psych eval to try to figure out this obsession with getting out of class to see the nurse, or to call home and go home. It's not like it's any particular class (it's all of them, even electives), or a kid bothering her, or a teacher she doesn't like, or whatever. Part of me is thinking she doesn't want to grow up and simply wants her mother to baby her and to let her stay home and watch television and do nothing. I don't know.

But man, she's wearing on our last nerve.

In Case The Wild Animals Attack...

The Nurse Groupie strikes again.

For those of you who don't remember (or would like to forget like I would), the Nurse Groupie is a student who wants to see the nurse every single period of the day for one thing or another. Excessive doesn't begin to describe her desire to visit the nurse. We've had two parent meetings about it - Mom requested the second one because NG is failing several classes (including mine) because she's too busy scheming for a way to get out of class or her mom has picked her up and taken her home. I have her the last period of the day and she's absent from my class on average of at least once a week. (Oh yeah, and Mom emails me before spring break and asks if I would send some extra credit worksheets home with NG so she could do those since she's failing my class. Only problem with that, as I explained to Mom, is I don't have or offer any extra credit worksheets. Oh, says Mom.)

So, after the last meeting, which included our Assistant Principal Mrs. Sparrow, Mom emails Mrs. Language (who is NG's homeroom teacher) and informs her that she agrees with us, her daughter needs to stay in class and unless she's missing a limb or throwing up (and I wouldn't put it past this one to stick her finger down her throat to do so), we do not have to let her go to the nurse or call mom. Mom would stand behind our judgment.

Except now NG is coming up with new strategies to get Mom's attention.

Yesterday she comes in, jokes around and visits with her friends in her homeroom, and then informs Mrs. Language that she needs to see the nurse as she "doesn't feel safe."

Mrs. Language pulls her outside in the hall to find out what she means by this and NG can't explain. She just doesn't feel safe. Mrs. Language sends her to see Mrs. Sparrow. Mrs. Sparrow can't get anything out of her either so calls Mom. Mom leaves work, drives to school, and parks herself in Mrs. Sparrow's office for half and hour to talk to her child. What they talked about, we have no idea. NG went back to class and Mom went back to work.

Today during planning I head up to the front office to drop off some ISS paperwork, and who should I see at the phone calling home? You got it! Nurse Groupie! So now she's getting her elective teachers (that change every quarter) to let her call home or go to the nurse since her mean core teachers are on to her game. I find out who her elective teachers are, give them a head's up and then let Mrs. Sparrow know what's going on.

Apparently she had allergies and needed to go home.

Now, let me talk a bit about allergies. I've had them my whole life. I know allergies. We're talking years and years of allergy shots, medication, you name it. And I never, ever, missed a day or work or a day of school due to allergies even when I felt like death warmed over. And this kid has never sneezed, sniffled, or so much as coughed in my presence, and she certainly doesn't have the watery red eyes that most of my allergy kids (and myself) have on those special spring and fall days then the allergens are flying. So honestly, I'm not buying the allergy story AT ALL.

Anyhow, Mrs. Sparrow is now on a mission. This kid is staying in class. So she intercepted Mom (who picked her up so the kid missed a whole day of school, a whole day of review for our VERY BIG DEAL GOVERNMENT MANDATED TEST WHICH IS IN TWO WEEKS, and hell no, I'm not giving her any freaking extra credit (which doesn't exist anyway) and I'm sorry your kid is failing but maybe if she stayed in school she'd actually pass, but I digress.) and laid it on the line for both Mom and Nurse Groupie. Mom is missing work dealing with Nurse Groupie's desire to leave school and Nurse Groupie is missing class.

Mom supposedly agreed (we'll see). The new policy basically takes us out of the decision making loop. Nurse Groupie is not to leave the room. If she needs to call home or see the nurse we are to call Mrs. Sparrow. Mrs. Sparrow will come and make a determination if she is sufficiently sick enough to see the nurse or call home. End of story.

We hope.

Oh The Aches and Pains!

Every year we have a couple of kids who qualify for that unique title of "Nurse Groupie". These kids will find a reason, no matter how big or small, to spend some time with the school nurse.

Nurse Groupies are not that unusual in middle school, although they tend to really flourish in elementary school with its corresponding numbers of boo-boos, infectious diseases, and just overall germiness. Elementary kids tend to actually need a school nurse more. Middle school students tend to become nurse groupies as a way of Getting Out of Class.

However, this year we have a student who quite truly tops them all when it comes to a Nurse Groupie. This kid doesn't just want to see the nurse once a day (which is pretty excessive), she wants to see the nurse Every Freaking Period of The School Day.

We noticed this the first week or so of school and quickly put a plan in place to keep track of her nurse visits in her agenda. Every other student gets a "go see the nurse form" filled out and off they go - Nurse Groupie has to have her agenda checked as well so we can see if she's already been that day. Mrs. Language has become, poor thing, an email pen pal with Nurse Groupie's Mom, and we had approval from her to limit the visits to once a day.

I do have Nurse Groupie the last period of the day, so by the time she lands in my room, she's already used up her visit. But there are times she'll ask to go, and it will run like this:

"Mrs. B, I need to see the nurse," she'll whisper (I can barely hear this kid talk even on a good day).

"Well, what for?" I'll ask as we have to put a description on the nurse form.

"I have a headache," or "My side hurts," or my favorite, "I need an aspirin for my allergies."

At the last one, I tend to blink at the kid and inform her that I too, suffer from allergies, and I've never needed an aspirin for them.

In any case, we've had two parent meetings with Mom who, on one hand, wants the kid in class instead of at the nurse because she's failing. (Big surprise, she misses instruction and then is absent a lot and never makes up anything.) On the other hand, she feeds into this constant litany of aches and pains and headaches and allergies and blurry vision and stuffy noses and.....

The last parent meeting involved the nurse, an administrator, and Nurse Groupie along with Mom. We basically said that she wasn't going to be able to go see the nurse unless it was a Dire Emergency because she was, again, failing and she needed to be in class. The Nurse backed us up and said the visits were, "just a bit unnecessary." Mom said she wasn't to go to the nurse again unless it was an emergency. Nurse Groupie blinked and nodded her head.

The next day Nurse Groupie said her side hurt. The day after it was blurry vision. The day after that it was a backache.

At this point I can't wait to see how she handles her 40's when every bit of your body can ache on a bad day.

In any case, Mrs. Language emailed her best Pen Pal, Nurse Groupie's Mom and informed her that NG apparently didn't get it.

The response...surprised us. It started off with an excuse about the blurry eyes (eye drops). She then, amazingly, grew a backbone and said that unless NG was on the floor throwing up, bleeding, or generally on death's door, she was not to leave the classroom to see the nurse. And mom, bless her heart, was giving us the latitude to make our own judgments as to whether she needed to see the nurse or not.

You can bet we printed that email out and put it in her folder as well as forwarded it to the Nurse and The Principal.

An interestingly enough...two days without requesting to see the nurse. Maybe she'll survive after all.

Update 3/9/10...Well, I was wrong. She requested to go three times today. Mom emailed and said she had a headache this morning and a stuffy nose. Of course, her excuse for me was she needed "girl products". Nothing about headache, stuffy nose, the plague...Oh good gracious.