Teachers saying "you would amount to nothing"

My 6th form tutor in 2010 said I would never get anywhere in life and should get used to saying "do you want fries with that?" for when I work at McDonalds. This was after we had an argument when I called him out for bullying me. I had various other teachers saying nasty things as well. I was quiet and shy at school and never did anything wrong. Most hated me as my sister was a nasty piece of **** previously. What makes it even funnier was this was at a private school that my parents paid £6k a term, so you would expect less of this rubbish.

In the 10 years since, I have:
  • Graduated with a 1st class honours degree.
  • Just about to buy my 4th house worth just over £1m after upgrading every few years.
  • Started and sold a business for a good sum of change.
  • Started working for a company earning probably close to his yearly wage every ~40 days in addition to getting given a good chunk of equity.
He's in his 60's and still having to work as a teacher. Jokes on him.
 
Guest2 said:
I remember as kid one of two of the teachers at my primary and secondary school would say things like "you will never amount to anything" and "you will be a bin man when you're older"

Now i'm not sure if teachers still say the same sort of things to kids these days but looking back now I am around their age (36) I can safely say they were wrong and am probably on at least 2 or 3 times the average teachers salary. I highly expect some of them will still be working now, maybe as elderly substitute teachers having to top up their pension in their 60s :D

Did your teachers ever say your would amount to nothing and would like to shove it in their face that they were wrong?
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Actually (and you might find this hard to believe) I had the opposite problem.

My teachers kept telling my parents I had potential.

I may have done but (if true) I must have squandered it. My current opinion of myself is that I'm barely scraping average, but I honestly believe I was built up way too much as a kid and it made me an arrogant little ****.

Can't blame other people for how I turned out, but I honestly think telling a kid they are the bees knees is also a massive mistake.
 
My French teacher thought I was a bit thick because I wasnt good at french. She was shocked when I said 8t was my worst subject on parents evening. But I have only had one truly nasty teacher. In 6th form. A business studies teacher. He was always in a bad mood.
 
Had mostly encouraging teachers but interestingly I was told we would all be unequivocally driving electric cars by the time we left school and learned to drive.

I've been driving ICE vehicles for 14 years...

Skidder said:
Some tried to bum me and / or beat me
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Username checks out.
 
My favourite was my RE teacher. I used to sit at the back of the classroom and, even from there, I could clearly smell how "Irish" his coffee was as he told us to "read pages X to Y" and preceded to drink said coffee without another word said until the end of the period, if at all possible. The topic once came up about what we'd do when we grew up and his answer (to the whole class) was "I don't care."
He was obviously living the dream.
 
Like many others, people saying horrible things to me as a kid just motivated me to do well and prove them wrong.

Think it used to be called, "character building" but it's more like an early lesson in how horrible people are in all honesty.
 
BongoHunter said:
I remember the careers advisor telling me I could expect to struggle to get anything other than factory work or armed forces.
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Not sure why the armed forces was/is used as a threat. £20k after training with significant rises, career path, £6k for further training of your choice + many courses throughout your career, non-contributory pension, free worldwide travel (to some not so nice places too) subsidised housing.

Dependant on the Force you join - some are just civvies in a uniform :)
 
I remember being told that I’d never get a job looking out of the window, strange that, I’m now a truck driver and spend pretty much all day looking out of windows.... :D
 
Bullied all the way through school and teachers did nothing - was still doing well up to Junior school when parents got divorced.

Bullying and divorce = off the rails and no interest.

I know teachers are not social workers, but no-one took the time to say "are you okay?" to an obvious drowning kid. I started dropping grades and moved down classes/sets and so got the crap teachers and crap opportunities.

But, this did spur me to the get the **** out of my small minded village and start a career elsewhere. Now 30yrs on, i redid my GCSES and obtained a BSc(Hons) in Computer Sciences. This was a pipe dream back then and i had resigned myself to minimum wage jobs

So my teachers despite been crap, did me a favour by showing no interest.
 
I remember being belittled by my English teachers for being lazy/terrible spelling/not applying myself as I was top sets for most stuff but barely scraping a C in English.


Was an eye opener going to college later in my 20s and getting tested for and conformed dyslexia within a few weeks as the trading officer noticed my written work was nothing like my verbal work.
 
My teachers always said nice things to me especially my old maths teacher, he would say things like; I had a bright future , I was very clever and that I was sexy. It really helped my confidence as a young boy and all of the extra one and one sessions after class really did teach me so much and he didn't even get paid for them but still did them every day! Although to be honest I can't really remember much about the after school sessions now, but they must have worked as I do remember always struggling during class room lessons but would still get A's in the tests he set. Just shows you that some teachers really go above and beyond and they can really touch a child which will have lasting effects for years to come.
 
Ninco! said:
80's - 90's kid. Yep, I got told I was basically a waster. It was meant as in wasted potential rather than an out right rebel.
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Ha yes I got this too. Don't really care, I had some rubbish teachers but also had some good ones too. Just didn't get on with formal education, but funnily enough love learning now.

I think I've done OK, so whatever.
 
My older brother got told that in secondary school, as he performed pretty terribly, but he now works high up in cyber-security earning 15x the average salary of a teacher. :D
 
In AS levels my economics teacher took me outside and said he thinks I should drop the class as he thinks it's too hard for me ( I did get a E on the exam). I said I didn't want to and the only reason he let me stay as it would affect my weekly £30 payment I received. I ended up doing resits and got a B overall in A-levels economics. That always annoyed me that he didn't have faith in me but I just found the transition from GCSE to Alevel really hard for the first year but then ended up with ABB.
 
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