Dad makes teacher cry for neglecting son, then finds out she's a 'nepo baby.' UPDATE

AITA for yelling at my son's teacher and making her cry?

Last Thursday I, 36M got a call from my son's school telling me I needed to come and collect him because he had passed out during class. My son has passed out a good few times before, so we've made sure he knows what to do when he starts to feel faint to make sure he doesn't hurt himself.

However, when I arrived at the school my son was holding an ice pack to his head, when I asked about it the nurse told me he had hit his head when he fell, I wondered why he hadn't lay down like we taught him to do, I brushed it off and decided to ask him about it later as he was still kind of out of it.

The next day I asked him about it and what he told me made my blood boil. Apparently when my son had first started to feel like he was going to pass out he tried to tell his teacher.

When he stood up to talk to her he was immediately yelled at to sit back down. The next time he tried to tell her she told him that he didn't look sick so he wasn't allowed to go to the nurses office.

Then, his class was doing an activity that required standing for practically the rest of the lesson, before the activity started my son, yet again told this teacher that he felt like he was going to pass out and asked if he could sit the activity out.

The teacher responded by yelling at him, claiming he was just being lazy and was making excuses. My son's friend was getting worried about him so he told the teacher, who then started yelling at his friend, accusing them both of trying to get out of lesson.

Not even a minute later my son passed out, and according to his friend and a couple other classmates, she acted very shocked, as if she hadn't been ignoring him trying to tell her how he felt for the last 5 minutes.

I'm extremely worried about the impact this will have on my son, as when the fainting first started he didn't tell any of his teachers as he was scared that they were going to yell at him, this resulted in quite a few injuries from falling.

It has taken a while for him to start telling them when he's feeling faint and I'm afraid this incident will cause him to stop asking and he will hurt himself.

I had wanted to go down to the school that day but my son had stayed off and my wife wasn't home from work yet. The following Monday I arranged an appointment with the principal. After I explained what had happened, he called in my son's teacher, who then tried to deny the fact that he ever told her anything and he had just randomly collapsed.

This is where I may be TA. By this point I was pissed, I began to scream at her, yelling about how my son could have gotten hurt. I was so pissed I hadn't even noticed that she'd started to cry. By that point I was asked to leave by the principal.

My wife and some of my friends think I'm in the right, but my parents and the other half of my friends think I went too far. I don't know about this one

What do you guys think, AITA?

[Edit] I'm just gonna answer some frequently asked questions that the answers weren't included in the original post

We are not in the US so a 504 plan is not in place, however we do have something similar

2)My son is in the middle of getting a diagnosis, doctors say the most likely option is POTS

3)My son is 13, and I would say he's a fairly well behaved kid, only sometimes getting in trouble for stupid shit that 13 year old boys do, he usually stops after he gets a verbal warning. We've never had any major issues with his behavior

4)Yes, the teacher was aware of his episodes

Here were the top comments on the original post — no one was happy with this teacher at all.

Content-Plenty-268

NTA. The teacher repeatedly yelled at your son, berated him, caused him to injure himself physically and quite possibly scared him away from communicating his needs in the future. She is a bully. When confronted, she started lying to cover up her behavior, and eventually crying. Boohoo.

That's what bullies do: bully, lie, then cry when not let off the hook. You losing your cool is completely understandable. Your parents don't need to have an opinion about it, and your wife is in your corner. Consult a lawyer. I bet the principal won't ask a lawyer to leave.

Glinda-The-Witch

I’m assuming your son has a diagnosed medical condition that is on file with the school and, his teachers have been made aware of his condition and how to prevent injuries? At this point I think I would take my concerns to the Board of Education and let them know that you intend to speak with an attorney.

Yelling at the teacher was probably not your best move, but I certainly understand when it comes to the safety of our children. It’s hard to maintain our cool sometimes. I’m going to say NTA.

C_Majuscula

NTA, that teacher is a bully who deserved getting called out. Yelling after she straight up lied is warranted.

If you're in the US, please get this condition and his accommodations into a 504 or IEP plan if it's not there already.

AilingHen

NTA. Well, you didn't need to lose your temper, but you're only human. She didn't act human when she neglected his needs. He asked to go to the nurse, ffs.

A couple months later, OP returned with an update just before the start of school.

The new school year starts tomorrow and we've just been notified that this teacher will not be returning for the new school year. The email we received claimed she has 'decided to move on to new opportunities'.

However, me and my wife have had a talk with some other parents and unsurprisingly that is not the case. Apparently my son was not the first or last student she has done this to.

This teacher is notorious for never letting anyone leave her classroom for anything unless she can physically see something wrong with them, even then there has been a few instances when she's told students having things like eczema flare ups to wait until the end of class.

She even tried to do the same thing to my son when he was having another episode, luckily since the last incident he's learned to ignore her, and him and his friend went down to the nurse despite what she said.

At the beginning of summer, my wife got a call from one of the other mothers, who explained that the teacher had tried to the same thing to her daughter, as it turns out she had a friend on the school board and is very well liked by all parents and staff.

She arranged a meeting with the teacher, the principal, the school board and the superintendent to discuss this teacher's behavior. Before the meeting she spent ages compiling evidence against this teacher.

She managed to get the medical forms of the students she'd denied access to the nurse to (with permission from the parents of course), she somehow got all the reports of her behavior towards students, she got statements from students, parents and other members of staff.

She even got a couple students who had more serious incidents to come to the meeting with their parents and recount what had happened. We couldn't be there since we were going on holiday (vacation) but both my son and his friend filmed them telling what happened and we gave it to the mother to play at the meeting.

When it finally came time for the meeting the teacher had not anticipated that the mother would be so prepared, and after an hour in the meeting, the teacher was finally fired after 6 years of mistreating students.

If you're wondering how she kept her job so long, I was too, turns out she was a nepo hire, the principal is her uncle.

For all those wondering how my son is doing, he's doing a bit better, though his episodes have been happening more frequently as of late. Thank you all for the advice and well wished on the original post, salt does seem to help sometimes.

Of course, comments still took the parents side. But they're not happy with the principal.

vevesumi

better keep an eye on that principle, see he doesnt try anything.

friendlily

The principal should be fired too. I'd work with that mom to get that in motion.

Solidashford

Thank the heavens for that Mom being so prepared and I think I might just send an email with the documents to the Associate Superintendent or next level up from Principal. The Principal knows she mistreats students and needs to lose his job and admin certification

This could've been a huge lawsuit