A dad has been left fuming after discovering the disheartening remarks made by his daughter’s teacher on her homework. The young girl had completed an assignment about her identity, which included sections for her aspirations and influential figures in her life.
In the ‘hopes and dreams’ section, she expressed her ambition to become a “perfect gymnast” and to compete in the Olympics, writing: “My hopes and dreams – to go to the Olympics for gymnastics. To be a perfect gymnast.” However, the teacher‘s response was less than encouraging, commenting: “Will never happen. Sorry.”
Outraged, the dad took to Reddit, stating: “My 11-year-old daughters teacher wrote this comment on her homework. I’m absolutely flabbergasted and angry. This after my daughter just competed in gymnastics nationals a month ago.”
Another educator joined the conversation online, expressing their shock at the negative feedback: “I could never imagine saying this to a student of any age. I had a 4th grade student once tell me their dream was to live on Jupiter. Even something like that wasn’t enough to make me tell them it wouldn’t happen. We instead talked about what kind of study he’d need in order to make that happen since no one has lived there yet.”
Another gym-goer chimed in: “I once told a runner at my workout centre that I’d like to run and finish a half marathon someday. He looked at me and said “you’ll never do it. ” I’ve finished over 20 of them now. At the end of my first one, closing in on the finish line I thought ‘**** you, Jim.’ So yeah, it could be inspiring in a way. Prove them wrong.”
A third user shared: “I broke my arm in high school and was getting my strength back. My max for bench at 1 point was 115 because my arm couldn’t support the weight. I told my weights coach my goal was 250 by my Jr year. I was a freshmen at the time. He said ya you’ll never get there. I hit 280 on my PR and ended up finishing my Jr year in the 1000lbs club for Squats, Cleans, and Bench. After every rep I’d say ‘**** you Mr. McKenna’.”
Another user criticised the teacher for discouraging the girl from following her dreams, explaining how a teacher made her believe she was bad at maths at school only to become a professor in calculus. They revealed: “When I was in first grade, my teacher told me multiple times that I was bad at math. I believed her because I was six. I believed that until the last part of college, when I finally had to take calculus for my major and I had put it off until my senior year. Professor for Calculus 2 asked me to be a math major… turns out I have a mind for math.”