Sometimes teachers should just be quiet

I was in a parent meeting with several other teachers. The issues were the student is bright, rushes through his work, isn't careful, doesn't turn things in and then wants another copy (2 or 3 or 4 times). [Don't bother to say that is unreasonable, we are to help these poor children pass with no expectation of anything approaching responsibility on their part. Talk about crippling a generation, but that is another post.]

One teacher starts reiterating the same thing [yes, that was redundant] we had all been saying and drifts into this complaint about she doesn't want to give copies because she doesn't have paper.

Did she not realize that the parents do not care who buys the paper? And that [to my way of thinking] the teacher just weakened everything we'd been saying?

The mother asked my if I was picking on him and I told her yes, but not the way the student was perceiving it. I said the bar for that class is set low for the rest of the class and that the student could easily walk over it. And that I expected more of this student than that - so, yes, I am picking on him. It isn't done to be mean but to help the student be a better mathematician. Kid was stunned.