Assignment
Cidu Bill on Mar 26th 2008
What exactly is going on here? Mrs. Keene is berating the teacher because Jeri got the assignment wrong? This wouldn’t even make sense if Mrs. Keene has ever shown signs that she even liked Jeri. Theirs is without question the most unsettling parent-child relationship in mainstream comics.
Filed in Alison Barrows, Preteena | 14 responses so far
dd Mar 26th 2008 at 12:34 pm 1
All week, there has been the theme of Teena and Jeri’s education being too fluffy and easy. Yesterday, Jeri had to get help with a math assignment… making a sock puppet.
So I think this is supposed to be another lesson for us about how crappy the schools are. I just hope it doesn’t last as long as the damned Christmas play crap.
Nicole Mar 26th 2008 at 12:45 pm 2
Jeri’s mother probably spent an agonizing night helping Jeri write the essay she didn’t need. That would explain why she is so angry — though she should be taking it out on Jeri
Cidu Bill Mar 26th 2008 at 12:56 pm 3
If this is a science class — as opposed to an English class — I’m not sure I see how an essay would be at all more valid than a poster, assuming each of them requires understanding of the course material.
All this would be more believable if Mrs. Keene simply spent the rest of the week verbally abusing Jeri for getting the assignment wrong.
pepperjackcandy Mar 26th 2008 at 01:23 pm 4
The only thing that makes sense to me is that Jeri came home and told her mother that she had to make a poster, and Mrs. K. didn’t believe her.
Rasheed Mar 26th 2008 at 01:39 pm 5
I imagine that Mrs. Keene IS yelling at Jeri and the teacher is merely overhearing it since Mrs. Keene didn’t bother to set the phone down before yelling.
Arthur Mar 26th 2008 at 02:11 pm 6
I don’t follow this strip, but I agree with dd. The teacher didn’t say that the poster was to be informative, but colorful. The mother is yelling at the teacher, not Jeri, otherwise the teacher’s last thought wouldn’t be appropriate. The teacher is clueless enough not to even realize why the mother is upset.
David Mar 26th 2008 at 02:20 pm 7
1) I don’t understand why the teacher is calling about the blown assignment. If there’s a pattern of blown assignments, yes, but if she called parents every time any student didn’t complete something, she’d never get off the phone.
2) “Colorful” That word seems to be important to the teacher, and I don’t know why a colorful science poster is superior to a colorless poster, unless the subject is light color. Sounds like the teacher is teaching warm and fuzzy science. In my high school, colorful posters were used for “school spirit”, student council campaigns, and fundraisers.
3) Mom could be yelling at the teacher, Jeri, or just yelling out of frustration. But if Jeri was capable of writing a thorough essay on the subject, she should be capable of getting the assignment right.
4) What’s the punchline of the strip? “The parents are worse than the kids” isn’t a punchline. Jeri screwing up an assignment or mom getting mad isn’t a punchline. Maybe the teacher’s ineptitude in assigning appropriate homework, and hamfisted attempts to deal with her students is the punchline, in which case dd called it in #1.
Cidu Bill Mar 26th 2008 at 02:21 pm 8
Of course if you’re right, Arthur, it’s possible she has a whole class full of Jeri’s who aren’t even bright enough to write down the assignment correctly, so she’s been forced to lower her expectations.
RB Mar 26th 2008 at 03:07 pm 9
I don’t read the comic, but I have two thoughts: 1) Jeri’s mother may have been the one to actually write the essay. That is why she was sure it was “very thorough” (hey, I’ve seen plenty of parents help out their kids this way). 2) Mom’s language is probably very “colorful” and her cursing is worse than that of her kids. Hence the last lines.
DPWally Mar 26th 2008 at 05:29 pm 10
Keeping in mind I don’t follow the strip (and don’t know which strip this is)…
When a teacher gives a kid a failing grade for something, first she has to deal with the frustrated kid, then she has to deal with the angry parent “How dare you fail my child!!”
I think kids usually understand that their work is being judged. The parents are worse because they can go into a mother-bear-defending-her-cub posture where reasons are irrelevant and no level of verbal abuse is too much.
Cidu Bill Mar 26th 2008 at 05:40 pm 11
Of course in this particular strip, Wally, the relationship is usually less mother-bear-defending-her-cub than mother-eating-her-young
Powers Mar 27th 2008 at 06:53 am 12
Yes, normally this could easily be the parent berating the teacher for something that was the child’s fault, but Tess Keene doesn’t work that way. Thus the mystery.
I agree there are a couple of possibilities: Tess is yelling in general frustration; Tess is yelling at Jeri and forgot to put the phone down.
As for the teacher’s reaction, either she thinks Tess is yelling at her and comments on this with the universal teacher’s lament (see my first paragraph), or she’s merely talking about volume and/or prowess at complaining.
The lack of clarity regarding what’s going on makes the strip just not funny.
Hunt Mar 31st 2008 at 08:27 am 13
I think the idea is that to Tess, it’s obvious that an essay is superior to a poster, and that’s what she’s complaining about. I’m on the teacher’s side here, though–Jeri couldn’t understand a simple assignment to do a poster?
Pat W. Kirk Jan 31st 2011 at 04:40 am 14
Times have changed. My teacher was always right and I was wrong, and that was just the way it was. I was not a poor abused child. Every child hid his or her transgressions from Mom. And I once had my son’s principal appologize for spanking my son (can you imagine that happening now? Knowing the principal it was probably just a spat on the rear), but they shook hands and he thought my son knew he was right. My son never mentioned it to me. He didn’t want to tell me WHY he was spanked.