Petronella van Gent:
CLASS OF 1969
Queen Elizabeth Public SchoolClass of 1969
Mississauga, ON
Petronella's Story
When i attended Grade 7 at the Queen Elizabeth Public School, i had only been in Canada three years at that point. It was exciting and somewhat overwhelming to be in a new school with all these new students from other schools in the area. This was the first year we had more than one teacher and took our different subjects with different teachers in their respective classrooms.
This was the year that everything changed for me, and in large part i had to thank one particular teacher for that drastic change. Mr C- was the man who did everything in his power to impact specific kids in his class and lucky me, i was one of them. He made going to school a living hell not only for myself, but also for at least one other student in our class (the other student's name was George if i remember right). I had never met a "teacher" at that point who could be that nasty and destructive to the spirit of a child/student. His treatment of the select number of students, was beyond reasonable or acceptable.
Having had a perfect record behaviourally it was an absolute shock to have an adult male teacher turn against a well behaved, cooperative student such as myself and George the other student in our class, the way that Mr C- did. It was clear to me that this man knew how to pick out the stude...Expand for more
nts who would not pose a threat to his abusive over the top treatment of them. I am surprised that no one ever reported this man. There is so much i could write but i will safe that for another time.
I can not end this without mentioning the one teacher who saw through all the injustices that i was going through in that school; Mr Jones⦠I will never forget Mr Jones, he recognized my capacity for learning, in fact he realized that I was a gifted student and well capable of achieving honour status. Mr Jones encouraged and expressed quite the opposite direction for my educational direction than that of Mr C-, who was so fervently trying to convince the entire staff of that school that i was something other than who i really was. I am for ever grateful to Mr Jones for believing in me and seeing me for who i really was, rather than blindly believing a psychologically imbalanced man who was doing his level best to oppress and emotionally destroy certain students.
I sincerely hope that George the other student in my class was able to rise above this abuse, because it was pretty intense and destructive, i know because i experienced it for myself as well. Mr C- was relentless in his abuse of power. If you had any struggles, he targeted you. This is my truth and i stand by it.
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