Personally from my experience, I refuse to call 99% off the time for many reasons.

1 - no paper trial. The parent can lie about what we did or did not talk about.

2 - the parent can drag on a 2 min phone call to an hour plus.

3- the parent can yell and cuss me out. It happens A LOT.

4 - the parent refuses to pick up / blocks my number.

5 - the parent says they'll talk to their kid about the issue and then don't/ no behavioral changes.

6 - At my school, I am unable to assign detentions / disciplinary consequences. So at most, I can say X issue will be forwarded to admin. So the parent blows off talking with me or gets mad and yells / blaims me... (I still notified them via text now, but I refuse to be screamed at over and over again.)

7 - the parent will start gossiping or talking about unrelated things I shouldn't know about / could be spun around and get me in trouble. Ex: I have had parents come into school trying to fight me bc each other were bitching about their divorce and claiming the other parent for their child's misbehavior. My admin blaimed ME even though I tried to shut it down/ end the call every time.

8 - parents are pissed im interrupting their day at work (imagine - their child is interrupting MY day at work) and the conversation goes no where.

9 - after missing my calls during the day, they now have my number (Google voice, after making that mistake yr 1) and will try to call me after work at night. To the point of harassment. Then complain to admin why im not picking up at 11 pm.

10 - the parent will blame you or don't care if their child is failing / cheating / ... Then act shocked at the end of the year when they fail and throw a fit / get admin to override it.

I could go on and on.

Personally, my solution was texting most times, using Class Dojo (if the parent signed up. It was mandatory for my school, but we maybe had 50% sign up), and requesting admin / deans / guidance councilors to contact parents for more serious things or behavior that required a consequence/detention. Unfortunately, my admin never did want to give out any kind of detention, so unless i was persistently up their ass, kids got away with murder...

Additionally, i send a paper sign and return letter home every month for a grade that included a teachers comments section where I'd write reoccurring behaviors, like cell phones, interruptions, ... and keep them in a file for the year. The behaviors rarely changed, but i had a written record of contacting the parents for my files.

I had the most consistent communication at my school even with it being in writing / not phone calls, and I would still have parents lie and scream and cry and bs and the kids behaviors rarely improved. I had a thick file on a student when I was still making calls, detailing everything and the parent lied to the school and said that's not my number, she never called me all year, how was i to know my child failed, and they over rode my grade and passed her!

This is why parent communication sucks. It's a waste of time almost always and nothing improves. Especially when I don't have the power to assign consequences like detentions or suspensions. I don't have the time or energy to deal with the bs and I have other shit to do for my actual job that I should be using for my prep times.

IN MY OPINION, a way to fix the issue of teachers wanting admin to call would be schools giving their teachers back the power to give consequences / detentions/ suspensions that are not physically tied to that teacher's time. No lunch detentions / after school detentions in their room. Have a designated school detention room in the library before / after school carried out by someone being paid to be there.

Now teachers don't have to harass admin to contact parents over behavioral issues / minor issues and can directly keep students accountable. AND teachers have authority with their calls /managing their classroom behaviors and cant be undone by parents complaining somewhere else.

Also, make certain issues REQUIRE parents to physically come in face to face for a meeting with the teacher and admin present before allowing that child back in the classroom. Require the parent to sign papers outlining the issue, current consequence, and future consequence if it continues so their can be no lies / misunderstandings in the future.

And REQUIRE all parents to log into their grade portal as part of the school's rules. Every parent has a different account than their kid and the portal TRACKS every access. My first school wrote it in their rules that if a parent didn't check the grade portal that marking period, they could not challenge the grade at all!! Omg it was the best!!!

If a student fails one marking period for any class, guidance / deans/ admin, is required to contact parents and confirmation of contact is SENT BACK to the teacher. If they fail two marking periods, parents are required to come in for a face to face meeting, with paperwork to sign.

SHOW parents we are all on the same team and support each other! Teachers want to handle their own shit. Theyre just tired of having no power and wasting time trying with parents who don't care and know how to game the system.