Teacher's post on declining parent participation has Facebook cheering

"Be involved in your child’s life."

ByABC News via logo
March 2, 2018, 10:29 AM
A teacher in classroom at her desk in this undated stock photo.
A teacher in classroom at her desk in this undated stock photo.
STOCK PHOTO/Getty Images

— -- If there's one way to get a parent riled up, it's to comment on their parenting.

That's just what Aimie Diprima Brown did on her Facebook page. Brown, whose profile lists her as a teacher at Cartersville Middle School in Cartersville, Georgia, showed how many parents wrote her a letter about their child in 2003 as compared to now.

For the past 15 years she has sent a letter home asking parents to tell her about their child in a million words or less.

"With all of the talk about guns in schools, why it’s happening, and how to solve the issue let me offer a little different perspective," she said in her post. "I go on to explain that I want to learn the child’s hopes, dreams, fears, challenges, etc and jokingly ask parents to limit it to less than a million words since we all know we could talk forever about our children."

But over the years, things have changed. While there was 98 percent participation the first year, now it's down to 22 percent. Homework, she said, has shown a similar pattern.

"With all of our other responsibilities in our profession, how are we supposed to get to know students so that we can identify the ones with the mentality and disposition to become a school shooter if parents are checking out of the academic process? How are we supposed to educate children when their parents don’t require, expect and demand their child complete their homework?" she asked in her post.

She went on, "Don’t wait until your child is the school shooter to let us know your child is struggling mentally. Don’t wait until your child is ineligible for sports or the day before report cards to check grades and question the teacher on why your child is failing.

Be a parent. Be involved in your child’s life so that you can help them through the issues with friends, the possible suicidal thoughts, and problems academically. I promise you, if parents spent more time with their children and got involved in their lives, we would see drastic improvements in our schools and our society."

The comments on her post were generally positive. Facebook user JuAnita Miller wrote, "Thank you for posting!! Unfortunately we as parents/adults are failing our children. Praying for all!!"

Monica Bell commented, "So sad love this idea & thank you for sharing ! I would be 1 to fill it out, it is my most important job to be my daughter's Mom & sometimes it's hard but totally worth it!"

Brown's post has been shared more than 100,000 times. Neither she nor the Cartersville School District immediately returned ABC News' requests for comment.