I have known this high school principal for sometime and have gathered a lot of regards for the man he is, the Education officers he was, and the principal he has been so far. He is known for reforming and reconstructing system into very friendly environment that every time he leaves a place people feel the emptiness he has left behind.
This time I came into close contact with him, over and over, and he spared me enough of his time to talk about his school and listen about my school, yes we were talking about students' problems and relative solutions, without ignoring the origin of the problems. It's interesting but disheartening to know that we actually have ideas about where the problems come from and how we could prevent them but there are major stakeholders who wouldn't do enough.
His few sentences touched me so much and made me think over it for days; he said, "I think I should quit this job before I make myself a merciless devil, who sits on this chair and watch parents cry for the mistakes their children committed. How many parents cried here in front of me! Those parents leave behind all the self respect for their children and beg of me to give them another chance.
"Our intention of helping the child together fails to convince the parents, they don't want to take their children home for some days and talk things out- they are backing off from the little help we are asking in helping their children. And finally when we leave them with no option they leave with bitter hearts.
"In a small society like ours I am already hurting too many people, who wouldn't understand, there are too many tear drops on my chair..."
Though enclosed within quotation marks, the words are not exact to the scale but I made sure the meaning and the intention is preserved.
- Posted using BlogPress from my iPad
Is this happening for good or bad, progress or regress, sir? We cannot judge anything inanimate and subjective, but it can be accessed on value. You can best light us and make clear, since you are in that teaching fraternity. What is happening, suspension, termination, or rehabilitation?
ReplyDeleteKelzang, school suspends a child and home suspends him too, where would the child go? School suspends him with good reasons and good intentions but it fails badly when parents don't play their part. Suspension should be a monitored on, where parents and school together work towards making the child fit to join the mass again... it's not happening, therefore schools are worsening the child by sending him away... I seriously don't know where we should begin!
DeleteHello, This post has made me think. I really feel it just shows how important teaching and education is and how hard some teachers try to help kids and the personal cost of that effort. I'm not a teacher but I have lots of teachers in my family; mother, mother-in-law, brother and three of my sister-in-laws. The people who have helped me most on my path in life have all been teachers. Yet, so often (but not by me!)the work of teachers isn't appreciated. I think too much is expected of teachers these days and there should be a clearer understanding between teachers and parents so that they are working together to educate children.
ReplyDeleteSo, I am a mother and I try my hardest not to leave my part of the job to the teachers. For example, I know that it is a school rule that the girls are not allowed to wear makeup or nailpolish to school. So, I do my best to make sure that my girls understand that rule and follow it so that the teachers are not having to spend time on that sort of thing instead of actually teaching. That's just a minor thing but I still think it's my job not the teachers and ultimately we're trying to get the children to take responsibility for their own actions.
It just seems to me sometimes that teachers are expected to be parents as well and that is just too much. So, it's a good thing to talk about because I feel lots of teachers feel it. Exactly the same thing happens here in Australia and the battles that some teachers have to fight in the class room are unbelievable. But I don't think teachers should feel on their own in this. Especially not this Principal you mention who is even thinking of leaving teaching when obviously he is a person who is trying to do his job properly.
Lots of food for thought. It sounds like you are fighting the good fight! Nicole
Dear Nicole, we have lots of resources in theory, long waiting for committed people to execute but we haven't yet figured out that we are the ones who should be acting. I don't know how long are we going to take to stop reading and start working.
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