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Understand the psychology of boys. Hierarchies are a natural evolution of the spirit of masculinity. We can try to argue against it, but it is a fact of being men. We form tribes around dominant personalities. This doesn’t mean that there is such a thing as “Alpha Males”, but from one day to the next, an individual can behave in such a way that the group sees as someone they admire, loathe, respect, or are afraid of. Doing those same behaviors again, and again, and again, makes people fit into roles around that behavior.That means that your bullies aren’t born to rule over you, and you aren’t born to be a victim. It’s hard to change their behavior directly, but you can change yours. Once you do that, things become much easier.So your situation.What I am guessing is that there are really just a few people that stick out in your mind that are really causing the problems. They’re the real bullies. When you say “the whole class”, it really isn’t, is it? The rest of the boys are probably just a bunch of guys who think the jokes are funny and don’t really notice that it bothers you, or, and you need to understand this, are simply more afraid to speak up for you than they see value in doing so.Think about it. That day when the bullies picked on someone other than you for a change, you didn’t step up for that guy, did you? You just breathed a deep sigh of relief that, for once, it wasn’t you. It’s nothing to be ashamed of and it’s completely natural.There is little value in being the hero against bullies. In fact, it is an act that brings negative value, so no one does it instinctively. We all wish someone would, so we make fables, movies, and video games where we can play out our fantasy of being the hero against evil doers, but in reality… no one comes to anyone’s rescue out of the goodness of their heart. Superman isn’t coming for you, and the other boys aren’t either. That’s because they aren’t Superman either. They just scared little boys trying to survive the path of least resistance. They don’t feel good about watching you suffer, I promise they don’t, but it is simply safer than risking becoming you.This is the bully’s power, to make people feel isolated, because really, it isn’t the whole class bullying you. You just feel that way because no one ever helps. This is how boys act.Focusing on your bullies, it helps to think of them as mindless beasts functioning off pure emotion. You’ve probably already done that, but doing it for real actually serves a purpose. The reason we think of them as beasts is because beasts are forces of nature. They are basically programmed machines that have predictable behaviors, which you can act on to get the effects you want.Simply wishing they acted better doesn’t make them do it. They can’t be reasoned with, because they function only on how much fun are they having. They need to be satiated because they really are just like animals. Right now, they’re having fun because they get to look forward to class every day to get a reaction out of you. What that reaction is, I don’t know.I want to say at this point that people have a bad habit in this postmodern society of our saying like, “We shouldn’t blame the victim. Society needs to teach them not to be bullies.” That’s great in theory, but it doesn’t help you. It is practicing some fanciful notions of utopian theory that shows just how disconnected some people are from reality.While they say that “we should fix the bullying”, what they’re really doing is depriving the world of practical self-defense to real world problems in the hopes that some overarching and half-witted program to make kids feel special will someone make the basic human desire of some kids to dominate those around them go away. Fun fact: it isn’t the kids who feel insecure who become bullies.Right now you need to accept that most of this is blaming the victim in that I am asking you to make choices that will change the way they behave toward you. They are beasts and beast are predictable, but demanding that society turn a bear into a fish isn’t going to happen, or at least, won’t happen until your kids are having kids, so accept that I’m telling you to change your behaviors and to accept that bullies are simply emotion driven beasts to be acted upon.Frankly, my ways are better, because these methods are about empowerment. Whereas theirs will just keep you weak, and they’ll just tell you that I’m a bad person for telling you to stand up for yourself. That being said, I’ll get off my soap box against postmodernism’s revision of the nature of boyhood.Back to the point: you have a few options:First off, you could evaluate your responses to what they’re doing. Change your reactions to deprive them of the joy of being bullies. This is hard. It requires you to be aware of what it is that triggers you, and to recognize when they use it. It’s also hard because you have to be in control of your emotions well enough to deny them, and take a different course of action than what your emotions tell you to. Not easy. I would advise role playing when you’re alone, by replaying back some of the situations you’ve experienced and thinking about what you should have done.Don’t just imagine all the clever comebacks you could have had or some superhero Kung Fu movie duel where you beat them all up. That’s not realistic, not even the comebacks. These guys live angry existences where they trade these lines all the time. You try to play their game, you’ll lose. I bet you already have some experience with that don’t you? So role play and think about all the other people in the room, not just you and not just the bullies, but all the silent people. What actions do they take in the moments leading up to an engagement? You might want to emulate them. Whatever the case, you’re going to have to not express your emotions so openly, as that is the behavior that bullies are out for.Next, if they badger you on, and on, and on — confront them on it, but do it in a way that shows them for what they are and deprives their power.“So do you plan to fight me at some point, or are you just talk?”Calling attention to the fact that most bullies are really just verbal abusers with no real threat to those they target suddenly changes the game. It says to everyone in the room that words are just words and beyond that, these boys are weak.I’m not saying engage with them in comebacks. I’m saying make the act of only using words an act that shows cowardice if there is nothing to back it up. If you say it with enough attitude, it shifts the dynamic into saying that you are willing to be a real threat if they want to get physical. You don’t use words, but you’ll defend yourself. So it makes it seem to this word abuse is just stupid.I’ll throw in a line of advice: you don’t need to say this to the actual most threatening one in the room. At least one or two of your bullies are just nerdy little followers in the bully clique. When one of those guys start trying to show off for his other bully friends, it might be a good opportunity to send a message to all of them, but through their weakest link. Remember, you’re not trying to defeat the biggest bully in the room; you’re simply trying to gain enough respect to improve your status in the hierarchy enough that they don’t focus on you specifically. It’s a cruel reality, but that’s how boys work.Now you have two further options. One is violence. Sorry, it’s an option. Obviously I mean the sort of school yard rough and tumble and never to engage in anything you think could become dangerous. If someone threatens to use a weapon or to cause real harm, then that's grounds to get them expelled for goodness sake. I’d be lying if I said it doesn’t sometimes work. I’m guessing you’ve seen some of my other answers where fighting my bully helped me greatly. Sometimes it works when we are talking about school aged bullies.Know the consequences, and I mean know them. If you get into a fight, will you be suspended or expelled? There has to be a line where you say the consequences simply aren’t worth the benefits. I was willing to take the consequences because I knew the worst I would get was a week or two of in School Suspension, which, all things considered, isn’t that bad given how bad I was being bullied and how much respect standing up for myself brought. That may be completely different for you. You might get expelled or who knows what. I don’t know what your consequences would be, but I always live by the saying that you can do anything you’re willing to suffer the consequences for.You could also get beat up pretty badly, which makes you look really stupid. You don’t want that either, obviously. I’ll say this, if you at least stand your ground, you’ll gain a lot of respect for that act and usually, it will help at least some. That said, resorting to schoolyard violence is a last ditch effort, and not the best option, and I really don't think it is in this case, so I honestly don’t recommend it if you feel you have another option.Which you do, because I’m about to give it to you:There is someone else in the room that we haven’t talked about — the teacher.Now, I’m not going to tell you to “tell the teacher.” That, if anything, makes it worse for you. If what you’re describing is happening, that teacher already knows but does nothing about it.As to “why?” that could be any number of reasons. Teachers are stressed out, so not eating your problems is, for some, a way to cope with a difficult job. For others, they are simply weak: too afraid to stand up to the bullies because they lack the ability to even exploit the authority they’ve been given.I don’t want to be too hard on these types. I remember even I was terrified my first day as a teacher for little sixth graders, and I had even been to Iraq with the Marines! That said, a decent teacher should grow into their role and learn how to control their students. Timidity is only a good excuse for a month.This next type just disgust me: many teachers are really just overgrown adolescents who want to be thought of as cool, so they never make enemies with the cool kids. I hate this sort of piece of crap teacher, because they care more about fulfilling their childhood need to be liked than about educating the children of today.That said, all three are solved with a chat following an incident. Make it a private chat after class, when no other students are around and after you’ve said the words, “So do you plan to fight me at some point, or are you just talk?”By that point, an obvious amount of abuse has taken place in your class, and what isn’t happening is learning. That’s when you tell this teacher to do his job. You tell them—don’t ask them—to stop the abuse. You tell them that they are responsible for educating you and the rest of the class, and what is happening here isn’t doing that. Education is their job, but by allowing an inexcusable amount of abuse in their classroom they are failing at it.That argument made, you tell them to do something about the bullying, or you’ll take this situation to their bosses, the Principal or Headmaster, to inform them that you don’t have a productive learning environment, because the teacher won’t do his job and manage classroom order and discipline.The teacher may tell you that you need to learn to deal with this sort of thing. That’s an attempt to escape responsibility. You already did your job with “…or are you just talk?” At that point, you need to stand your ground and say clearly, “No. I already stood up for myself. Now, you need to take control of this class or I will go to the Principal.”He’s going to hate you, just so you know. There is nothing worse than realizing you’re a terrible teacher, especially when it’s a kid that makes it so clear. That’s a resentment they are going to hold, along with a lot of guilt. The fact is, you can choose to have him mad that you hold his testicles to the fire, or you can deal with being the victim. The fact is, if he is allowing abuse in his classroom instead of spending every waking second trying to make you better students, he sucks and needs to have that lesson made clear to him. Frankly, he’s hurting the education of a lot of people by not doing his job. Let that be some solace.The next day, when the bullying starts up again, you glare that teacher straight in the eye as if to say, “Well? What are you going to do about it?”If he does his job, then no need to worry about it. And when they bully you again, you hold him accountable again, and again, and again, and again, until the bullies realize that the environment is not one they can manipulate anymore, and your teacher has finally grown up.If he doesn’t do his job, you pull out a piece of paper and prepare what you’re going to say to the Principal. Make it clear and factual. When you prepare to go to the next class, instead, tell its teacher that you will be late, as you need to have a conference with the Principal. Then go make your case, both against the bullies, and, far more important, against the teacher. That’s the principal’s responsibility, too.At this point, if absolutely no one on the faculty steps up to get something done about a situation any of them could solve, then at least they don’t have an excuse to ask what the problem is. They also won’t have any excuse when you get in trouble and have to explain it to your parents. They’ll know that, and that’s why you probably will never have to resort to it.I hope this helps. I sincerely do.

I’m not autistic, and do not intend to offend anyone on the spectrum by answering this question. I am, however, the mother of a wonderfully bright, funny, kind, and completely traumatized 11 year old aspie. He is traumatized NOT because he has autism, but because of how society, mainly public school staff, has treated him for most of his life. THAT is the dark side of autism that no one talks about.My son was so excited to start preschool. Although he is very attached to me, he wasn’t upset about being in school all day, or worried about missing me. He wanted to be with other kids and learn. Fast forward to today, he is in the 5th grade and currently homeschooled. He doesn’t want to go anywhere, he prefers to stay in his room, and doesn’t like to be around other people.What caused this change? The public school system. Preschool was a nightmare. Even if he hadn’t had a developmental disability that wasn’t diagnosed yet, the teacher at his public preschool was a beast. She believed all 4 and 5 years in her class should behave the same, eat the same food, like the same things… all things that she thought were appropriate and “right.” Any deviation from outside the box was a problem and punished. I arrived at the school unannounced one time to pick my son up early, only to find him eating by himself at a separate table. I can’t remember the “offense “, but it was something like not listening/following directions. He has never been violent with adults or other children. And it doesn’t matter. If his behavior were that severe, I should have been called to pick him up, isolation is NEVER acceptable.I often have been mad that a trained professional didn’t recognize the signs and recommend evaluations, but I also take responsibility for not getting him a correct diagnosis until he was 7. I was always told he was fine and I was being paranoid, despite my gut telling me otherwise. Even when I WAS called to come get him the day the fire truck demonstration caused a full blown meltdown, I was still told there was no need for concern.Kindergarten and first grade were the same, except for having a caring kindergarten teacher. However, music, gym and art classes were awful, he was not allowed to go on several field trips, and one note from the principal noted that his behavior was “intentional and well thought out.” Seriously?? Even without the autism diagnosis, he was diagnosed with ADHD around 6, and don’t most kids that age have some difficulty with impulse control?? Yet this elementry school principal was laying the ground work for premeditation.The autism diagnosis did nothing to change their attitude towards him, and I had to withdraw him the first time half way through the 2nd grade. That same child that loved going to school in preschool and despite the issues there was excited about kindergarten and insisted on riding the bus to school the 2nd day, was in full school refusal mode. Third and fourth grades were spent at an out of district placement, and last summer we were informed he could no longer attend that elementary school, and would have to return to his home school for 5th grade.I was going to appeal the decision, but my son said he would try it. I thought since he was willing, and maybe the last two years had given him some maturity, impulse control, and self confidence back, it was worth a try. I also thought it might be a good transition before middle school, which I was also dreading. I was wrong.My father passed away in September and my son was concealing what was going on at school because he was concerned about me. By November he couldn’t handle anymore and disclosed to his private therapist the verbal and emotional abuse through humiliation, bullying from a few students but mostly teachers, and physical abuse from his “autism specialist” in the form of placing ice packs on his neck and even once throwing water in his face to wake him up one morning. Him being sleepy sometimes was a huge irritation for them, despite having a chronic illness form from a behavioral and developmental pediatrician for chronic sleep issues. Sleep problems that I now realized were 100 times worse those months because of his increased anxiety about sleeping at night so he wouldn’t get in trouble the next morning.So that’s the dark side of autism. An 11 year old boy whose spirit is already broken. Public schools denying autistic children their right to a free and public education because they won’t provide the accommodations necessary for these kids to be successful and feel safe to attend. Behaviors directly related to their diagnosis being viewed and reported as discipline issues, and telling them they are “bad” and constantly reinforcing that message.Teachers excluding, isolating, and alienating autistic students, sending the message to other students that this is ok, reinforcing that different is less than, instead of teaching acceptance and inclusion. Punishing them for sensory issues they didn’t ask for, and can’t control, instead of making their class a comfortable, sensory friendly environment. My son received ISS for covering his face with his jacket, being rude to a classmate, and saying “you stink!” That was the school report. However, when I asked my son what happened he told me yes he covered his nose, asked the music teacher if he could move, which was denied, and then told the little girl, “I’m sorry, I’m not trying to hurt your feelings but to my nose your perfume really stinks and I can’t help that it’s making sick.”Could he have been a little more polite? Probably. But he’s also 11 years old with a disorder that at it’s root causes communication problems. He also could have been moved when he requested it, BEFORE he said a word to the classmate, just like his therapist and I had advised him to do in those situations. He also said he wasn’t going to say anything to the 5th grade girl doused in I’m sure cheap cologne, but she got upset and started crying so he wanted to explain that it wasn’t her and he wasn’t trying to be mean.So, even after doing what two adults told him to do, he still got in trouble, still was the trouble maker, still was “the problem.” As he gets older I assume he will be able to handle those situations better. But he’s a child, too. So instead of being outraged that the neurotypical girl got her feelings hurt, which I’m not even convinced was the case, he could have been moved or it could have been an educational opportunity to explain sensory issues. I asked him if he told the vice principal what happened when he was sent to the office, he said, “No, it wouldn’t have mattered.” He’s already resigned himself to the fact that his feelings, emotions, issues, struggles dont matter. That’s the dark side of autism, from a mother’s perspective.Edit: I should have also noted for those not familiar with ASD, when I mentioned the fire truck at the preschool, the noise from the sirens caused the meltdown. And even though a teacher should never touch any child in an insulting and provoking manner, it was especially harmful to my son who still has to take baths, and won’t take a shower because he cannot handle water in his face.

I’ve served as a daily substitute, a supply (long-term) substitute, and a contracted teacher. The differences are significant…obviously.Aside from the “subs just follow plans and don’t usually grade,” here are some noteworthy differences:Classroom managementAs a sub or supply, you’re rarely with your students from day one. This is a big deal in terms of establishing classroom management and policies. Subs have to follow the teacher’s plans, yes, but they’re usually stuck with whatever classroom management plan and policies the contracted teacher has put in place (or not). This can cause serious headaches if the regular teacher has lax management and can’t put any fear of consequence into the class for poor sub behavior. A full-time teacher can establish his own policies and procedures (within school guidelines, of course).On the other hand, if a substitute gets handed an extremely challenging class, he only has to survive the period or the day and can opt not to sub for that teacher or class again. A full-time teacher is stuck with those difficult students all year.Classroom environmentWhen you’re the teacher, the instructional space is yours. Even though many schools require teachers to share rooms or move around between classrooms during the day, a contracted teacher is able to establish him or herself in the environment and learn his or her way around the school and the room. This provides a level of comfort that contributes to confidence and presence in the room that most subs aren’t able to have (even with repeated visits to the same school).In addition, content matters. When you’re a sub, it’s hit-or-miss whether or not you know anything about the subject area or lesson for a particular teacher. When I was subbing in an ELA classroom, I would gladly offer to help the students with their work. When I had to sub in a coordinate geometry class, I would quietly slink behind the desk and hope no one discovered that I had completely forgotten how to determine the area of a circle or that the only “Matrix” I understood was the one with Keanu Reeves.You “own” your space when you’re a full-time teacher, and it does wonders for your confidence and comfort in a school.School relationshipsTeachers really get to know their students. Frequent subs may run into the same students and develop working relationships with them, but only a classroom teacher can delve into the learning habits of the kids—their school lives, home lives, academic interests, etc. Building this rapport with your students makes instruction and classroom management much easier.Likewise, a teacher becomes part of the school in a way that a sub can’t (at least not as easily). Teachers can (and are often required to) attend school events. You get to meet staff and develop working relationships with your colleagues. You can get involved with parent events, fine arts, and sports. You can sponsor clubs. You become part of the school in a way that subs and supply teachers aren’t able to.PaperworkSub: take attendance and leave a note at the end of the day.Teacher: attendance, lesson plans, RTI data collection, RTI data entry, grading, IEP paperwork, ESL paperwork, assessment creation, data collection, differentiation, retention paperwork, grading, gifted paperwork, medical documentation, office referrals, syllabus writing, grading, assessment feedback, BIP data collection, student contracts, student recommendations, GES-3 evaluations, grading, parent letters, self-evaluations, walkthroughs, probation forms, grading, etc., etc., etc…Background and qualificationsTo become a substitute in my county, you must apply, pass a background check, and take a day-long course to receive sub certification. Then you get called to sub. You can accept or decline any offer. Your professional background generally doesn’t matter.To become a teacher in my county, you must have certification through an accredited teacher preparation course, pass a content-area exam (the GACE) to be deemed “highly qualified,” pass a background check, apply to/interview at schools and receive an offer to teach. After this, you sign a contract that must be renewed every year.PaySub: (in Georgia) $70–$100 a dayTeacher: (in Georgia) average between $40,000 and $60,000 a year, depending on the county[1] and teacher education level/length of service.ResponsibilityAll of this boils down to responsibility. While both subs and teachers have student safety as their first priority, the brunt of the responsibilities obviously fall on the teacher’s shoulders. The end result is that becoming a full-time teacher is a serious investment compared to subbing.Footnotes[1] Which Georgia school systems pay teachers the most?