Teachers Reveal The Names They Absolutely Wouldn't Use For Their Own Kids

Nobody has a front-row seat to naming trends quite like teachers do.

Parents-to-be considering baby names have all kinds of reasons for excluding certain names from their list. For example, giving a child the same name as a cousin is generally frowned upon — the name is viewed as already “taken.”

People also tend to avoid names they have negative associations with, like a childhood bully or a teenage nemesis. We all have memories of friends (or enemies) that we’d rather not revisit every time we call our kids to dinner.

Teachers, however, face a unique challenge when naming their children. They have dozens, potentially hundreds, of associations with different names, plus an insider’s view of how baby name trends are playing out in their field. You don’t want your kid to have the same name that five of their future classmates will have.

We asked teachers in our HuffPost Facebook communities which names they ruled out when choosing one for their own child. Here’s what they said.

“I had my boys before I taught. But one year I had a Larissa, Clarissa, Marissa, and Carissa all in the same class. They were all quite offended if I mixed up their names. I resorted to calling them Miss _______ (insert last name).” — Jami Nicholette, Pennsylvania