Teachers talked about “forbidden love” with students: how to be

Among the many difficulties in the teaching profession that teachers complain about in their public pages, there is also this: what to do if a student falls in love with you? After all, there are many such cases, and they are easily explained: smart and interesting teachers, both women and men, evoke feelings in schoolchildren of the opposite sex, with their hormonal explosion. We discussed this sensitive topic with teachers: what do they do in such situations?

French President Emmanuel Macron, as you know, fell in love with his almost 40-year-old teacher at the age of 15. His youthful passion has grown into a strong family union, because the couple have been together for 15 years. Despite the bewildered whispers behind their backs, Macron is said to still look at his wife with loving eyes. Although, we note, they still got married many years after school, when Emmanuel was already 30.

But such stories, developing into a long marital union, are rather an exception. But in general, our male teachers are afraid of any increased signs of attention from high school students and high school girls – for obvious reasons.

The other day in one of the Russian schools there was a New Year’s Eve, and an 11-grader invited his 29-year-old biology teacher to dance. She nearly fainted. “I was ready to fall through the ground…” she describes her reaction. – Politely joked. You should have seen his face! .. With the words: “Excuse me, please. I myself did not expect that I would make up my mind, ”he, drooping, left.” And then the teacher reproaches herself for putting her relationship with the students on a friendly footing. “They share their life stories with me, they come to drink tea… It is very comfortable and easy for me to communicate with them. And now I feel so sorry for this boy…”

MK discussed this common situation with teachers. Half of them believe that there is nothing wrong if the teacher danced with the student: “It’s just a dance, why wind it up?”. Someone even accused her of unprofessionalism and incorrectness. Like, they themselves danced like that, and nothing.

“I was 25 when I came to school, and some high school boys fell in love with me,” a teacher from the Voronezh region told MK. – Someone confessed immediately, someone – after many years. I think it’s ok. Now they are all good family men. By the way, I had a colleague who married her student, they have a difference of 7 years. They have been together for 42 years.

But the other half of the teachers are sure: the teacher should never cross the boundaries of “teacher-student”. Including, even “get closer” in the dance.

“A teacher (regardless of who he is and how many years he has been working at school) should have such a distance that it would not even occur to any of the students to invite them to a dance,” a 34-year-old teacher from the Russian provinces said. “What if the next time the students invite her to drink?” Will it go too? A friendly attitude – yes, help in organizational matters and on the subject – yes, even tea drinking – yes. And then there is the line beyond which it is not worth stepping over. You create problems for yourself, it depends on the teachers themselves. If this boy falls in love, what will this teacher do? The dance will only warm up interest in her as a woman (I hope I don’t need to explain how it warms up). And then, perhaps, this boy will do something to himself because of her … So much for dancing.

Dmitry Petrovich, an imposing-looking teacher from Kazan, spoke about a similar case from his MK practice:

– I know many such cases when girls fall in love with young male teachers. I also had such a situation when I was 25 years old. I then taught history and geography. Once I felt special attention to myself from one of the 9th grade students. It happened subtly: as if in jest, one of the schoolgirls told me that her friend loved me. I answered something unimportant, showing with all my appearance that I did not attach serious attention to this nonsense. Apparently, my unwillingness to take advantage of the love of an inexperienced girl was so decisive that it had no consequences. This was in the late 80s-early 90s. In general, I must say, falling in love on the part of high school students was then a common occurrence. But fatal passions were not observed, since Soviet upbringing taught us all to keep ourselves within the bounds of decency. There were no wild stories about immoral teachers and dissolute students then, they were simply unthinkable …

“In my class, where I am a class teacher, the boy was in love with a new physics teacher all his eighth grade,” Elena, a teacher from a school near Moscow, shared, in turn, with MK. She understood this, but pretended not to notice so that the boy would not misunderstand her. In my opinion, it’s better to really either pretend that you don’t understand, or gently explain that this is not what he needs. Students under the age of 18 are legally children, and if the teacher reciprocates, this can greatly damage his reputation, and maybe even go to court. I don’t think any teacher would want to be in that situation. If everything happens after they leave the roles of teacher and student, and the former student becomes an adult, then with mutual feelings, you can try to build relationships.