I feel like I’m being harassed by my teacher, and I’m a little scared

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I’m not necessarily looking for any advice, but if anyone has any it would be greatly appreciated! I (21 female) am in my freshman year of community college. This all started a few weeks into the semester where my English teacher (older 50s-60s male) asked me to stay after class one day. (He owns a coffee shop along with being a professor) when we were chatting after class he asked me if I would be interested in working in his coffee shop. He said it would be something like an internship but, but it was really just a barista job. He gave me his personal phone number. I did at first say I would be interested to come in on that Sunday to check out the place during an event they were hosting and to maybe shadow one of the employees. As the days were going on I kept getting a worse and worse feeling. So the night before I was supposed to come in he texted me to ask for a time I wanted to come, I then texted him saying I was no longer interested and blocked his number. (I forgot to mention that he would constantly single me out and call on me for almost every question he would ask the class, but I didn’t think much of it at first, and the job at the coffee shop was a private invite to me only and no one else in the class, and had no idea of my previous work experience or anything). After I declined the job offer everything died down up until 2 weeks ago. He started singling me out again and making comments constantly about what I was wearing, talking about sex and other things that didn’t have anything to do with English class. For example last class he was making comments about me taking three hours to get ready ever morning (I always come to class with a little bit of makeup and a put together outfit), made another comment about how people find their partners based on their proximity to each other and said he would have a better chance of dating a former student than someone from Toledo, and then asked me if I knew were Toledo is. (There are so many other things that have happened but this already long post would be even longer). Today was the weirdest of what happened. I was sitting at my desk waiting for him to come in and start class and when he sat down he told me come up to his desk to talk to me. He then handed me his car keys and asked if I could go to his car and grab his phone that he left in the car. I didn’t want to make a scene in front of the class so I just did what he asked. When I came back with his phone he said “thank you so much I owe you a big favor” when I was walking back to my seat and after class I got a few weird looks from two of the girls in my class. I’m so nervous that people are getting the wrong idea of what’s happening and people are thinking there is something going on between us, when there isn’t. I’m afraid if I don’t let this slide I will be punished by him. He kind of puts me in a position where it makes it extremely hard for me to tell him no.

Posted Nov 5, 2025, 11:47 PM UTC

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