Being called out is never a palatable thing to go through, and this can come as a surprise whenever we suffer such a fate. Regardless of whoever it's who calls us out, be it a friend, family member, subordinate, superior, or the like, the feelings are the same. Although it's worthy of note that what happens thereafter defers depending on the situation of things and how well enough the receiver can manage their temperament, I've been in those shoes, and today I'll love to share my story.
Being called out sometimes can be good, especially when we're wrong and wouldn't have changed had someone not done the needful for us to put our behavior and character into check, and thereby we can work on ourselves to be better and treat others nicely or do things in a better way than we've In the past, although there are situations when we aren't wrong and yet we're called out, this can be annoying, and I'll love to go back in time to last year when someone called me out wrongly.
Like some of my old audience might have known by now, I'm a teacher by profession, so there's this tradition that happens most whenever examinations are coming up in the school, and that's the need for students to pay a fee of 300 naira for the booklet they'll use for their exams. This was what I was told when I deployed here, and it was also made known that each class teacher is responsible for collecting the money from the students in their class before the examination kickoff.
As I'm a class teacher, I informed my students about it and asked them to relay the message to their parents and pay on time. Fortunately for me, all the students who were present in my class often prior to the exams paid, and I immediately gave the money to the person placed in charge to collect everything and purchase the booklets.
While giving her the money, I also wrote a list of the names of the students who paid and gave it to her, so she'll have evidence whenever she goes to the class, but she didn't collect it, and the reason why I wrote those names in the first place was because in the previous exam we did before this particular one, she made some statements that I didn't like, but yet I kept calm out of respect for her age and rank, so writing this name was to prevent such from happening again, but she refused to take it.
Although the total population of students in my class was 80, only 67 were active during the school session, and all those 67 paid; some of the other 13 already left the school, while some just don't show up in school until it's exam period. Among those are four students who came for the exams despite not paying, but there's no way I can know because after remitting the money, I have to supervise examinations in other classes.
One thing led to another: the lady in charge of collecting the money went to my class to be sure everyone who's sitting for the exam had made payment, and while she was there, she saw 71 students instead of 67 that had paid to me. According to what I was told, she asked those who hadn't paid to come outside, and none of the students came out, so she assumed within herself that I'd collected money from the other students and spent it without remitting all the money to her.
Immediately, she left the class and started shouting at the top of her voice within the school premises, calling a teacher a thief and saying that this isn't the first time they're doing it. I could hear her and was even wondering who could be our prey this time around because she's fond of this issue. Unknown to me, I'm the one she's referring to as a thief. She got to the class I was supervising and started yelling and calling me names.
I was literally boiling and couldn't bear it any longer, especially given the fact that we had some external supervisor within the class when she was saying all of those, and the next thing that came to my mind was that if I keep quiet again, these people will assume I truly did what she said, so I flared up and started returning all her words with mine. I called her names, and while those supervisors tried to caution me, I refused because they said nothing when she was ranting.
I asked her a simple question in their present: didn't I give you the names of the students who paid? Why didn't you collect it? I tried as much as possible to avoid this moment. That's why I went the extra mile to write another list, so while I've got a copy of the names of those who paid, you'll also have it because while you're free to walk around classes during exams, I won't because I'll be in another class supervising, and the list is what would have made your job easier.
Well, to cut a long story short, seeing how angry I'm and the fact that several pieces of evidence were against her, she angrily left, saying I'm rude and how dare I talk to her like that. After the exam, the school vice principal called me to find out what happened, and I explained everything to him. He apologized, but then he said I'd have to go apologize to her, and I just laughed and told him he must be joking.
Someone called me out wrongly, made people think of me as someone I'm not, and you expect me to apologize when they're the ones at fault. Well, I told him point blank that I'll never apologize, and if at all they'll want me to still continue to help them collect the money from students in subsequent exam periods, then she must apologize to me; if not, that's the last time I'll collect the money, because I don't want to have anything to do with her again.
Well, she didn't apologize, and I also made up my mind to do as I've vowed, but by the time we resumed school this year, the woman in question was transferred to another school, and so I think within myself that since she's out, I'll just collect the money since it'll be dealing with someone else this time around, then I can manage except this new person also turned out to be the same, but fortunately the new person was different and we had no issues, nor did she have issues with other teachers on this matter like the previous woman did.
That being said, based on my experience of being called out wrongly and how I react to it, do you think I went too far? What would you have done if you were in my shoes? I'll love to read your opinion in the comments section.
Thanks so much for your time. Do have a wonderful day and stay blessed.
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