May 23 2007
Attention Issaquah Schools Foundation: Here is how NOT to get a donation - Updated: apology added
My wife was sitting at home this evening, when the phone rang. It was a young man, calling from the Issaquah Schools Foundation who is having a phone-a-thon.
The call started nice, as he began his spiel for a donation. My wife knowing we were between checks tried to end the call quickly and not waste the kids time.
He thanked her and hung up. But before he did, he left her with this parting shot:
Thanks, but because of you kids are going to suffer.
My wife was stunned at the audacity and rudeness, so using her caller ID, she returned the call, and had a short discussion with the woman who answered.
The woman was properly shocked, as she should be.
I do not begrudge any group the need to raise money, though I admit the Issaquah School District and I have a long history of not seeing eye to eye about funding, spending and other matters stemming from a strike several years ago.
But I draw the line at rudeness and strong arm tactics. I draw the line at using unfair guilt.
Note to the child on the phone: Remember, you are cold calling my house, during my dinner time and soliciting money from my family, which puts you two strikes down in the rudeness department
Don't make it a clean sweep and add insulting behavior..
Someone seriously needs some training, and they owe us an apology.
And I would advise not calling tomorrow.
Update:
I received this from the ISF:
Dear Karl,
I am very grateful that you contacted us again so we could have the opportunity to apologize to your family! We were mortified to learn of the conversation one of our student callers had with your wife and because we do not know the number of incoming caller at our ISF office and she did not give her name, we were concerned we would be unable to contact you to apologize.
We deeply regret and are sorry for the conversation your wife had with one of our callers on our behalf. We required training prior to the actual calls and could not believe one of our students would behave so ignorantly and irresponsibly. We repeatedly stressed polite phone etiquette during our training sessions and in their packet of materials. We had approximately 150 high school callers each night who made over 10,000 calls. Thankfully, yours was a relatively isolated incident (to the best of our knowledge).
We had parent and coaches circulating constantly throughout the evening, looking for opportunities to reward good behavior and squelching bad behavior. We were unable to determine which student the call came from (or they would have been removed from phoning and severely reprimanded.) Although, once the employee at our office notified us of your wife's call, we looked for a few possible offenders and began closely monitoring their calls.
I deeply regret the incident and the consternation this caused you both. Now that we have your names, per your wife's request, we will remove you from future calls of this sort. Be rest assured that we will again focus on appropriate telephone behavior in next year's student training and this incident will provide an excellent illustration of how not to conduct yourself!
If you would like to have any further discussion regarding this matter, please feel free to contact me at our office at 425-416-2045. Thank you again for bringing it to my attention so we could have the opportunity to apologize.
Sincerely,
Robin Callahan
Executive DirectorIssaquah Schools Foundation
Helping Students Succeed
| P.0. Box 835 | Issaquah, WA 98027 | 425.416.2045 | www.issaquahschoolsfoundation.org |
Apology Accepted.
In closing I am somewhat concerned overall about how schools will use students for activities like this. The kids asked to help in fund raising to sell cookies, pizzas, t-shirts, Gift packages and even one year, cookie dough.
They happily sign up to sell candy bars, coupon books, knick knacks and all manner of services. Car washes, Walk-a-thons, etc etc ad naseum.
The WEA and the unions even encourage the kids to walk the picket lines for their strikes.
The issue deteriorates into a debate about school funding, but funding is not the issue. The State and Federal spending, not to mention local contributions from levies is very high (even adjusting for inflation), so money is not the issue. I would submit that there are likely more issues involving spending then funding.
But that is a separate debate. My unhappiness is the manner in which our kids are gently turned into sales people for the schools to raise money. And increasing the funding may seem to make it unnecessary, but my cynicism doesn't think so. The sales and fund raising for additional money would likely continue unabated.
Schools are there to teach our kids, and prepare them for life and their careers. But not just a career in fund raising.
84 Responses to “Attention Issaquah Schools Foundation: Here is how NOT to get a donation - Updated: apology added”
The proper response would have been to tell the little shit 1) We like it when snotty kids suffer and 2) get an after-school job…
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