7 June 2000

Parents in education

Posted by DAVID BC TAN under: Uncategorized.

I can understand why some people choose not to read the papers, and I can’t blame them. There’s only this much mulch a person can stomach! Yet, I am drawn to them, by force of habit, as much as to confront the issues that challenge our christian witness. Of late, the headlines grabbing our attention are not merely the Sipadan hostage crisis or events taking place in Fiji. I’m referring to another crisis that’s hogging the newspaper columns: school violence and the unabated cries for education reforms.

Domestically and abroad, violence in schools is escalating with sickening regularity. A year ago, the Columbine High School massacre sent shock waves around the world, to be followed by other equally tragic killings mere weeks apart. More recently in America, a 13 year-old boy fatally shot a language teacher in the face, in school. While guns are not so easily available in Malaysia, recent reports of violence here are no less discomforting. Instead we read of marauding schoolboys in uniforms clashing in broad daylight, gangs beating up their peers, a band of schoolgirls preying on adults in public restrooms, schools and staff room set ablaze by vindictive students.

Which of us parents is unperturbed?

As if that is not enough to confirm the dire state of our schools, the authorities engage in sham semantics (”It’s not gangsterism, but hooliganism.”), self-denial (”Only 1% reported.”) while claiming the issue’s blown out of proportion by a zealous press. No one, least of all parents, is amused.

Common sense tells us that the root of the problem lies neither with the school system nor the governing authorities, but in the home. It’s a common enough tale known to us in the examples of Eli, and then Samuel’s sons, and in the anguished cry of King David, “My son, my son Absalom! If only I had died instead of you.” These episodes in 1 Samuel make painful reading. Interestingly, the recent box-office movie ‘Gladiator’ has a poignant moment where an aged Roman emperor admits to his less than virtuous heir that “The faults of the children lie in the flaws of the father.”

It is heartening therefore to know that in educational circles, the familial component is now stressed more and more. Increasingly in US schools, parents are included in their curriculum, often with scheduled involvement throughout the year. Research, it seems has borne this out, as reflected in longitudinal studies conducted on the well-regarded Head Start programme in the US. Would that more schools and their PTAs sit up and notice.

Homeschoolers may be on the right side of the debate, but that does not diminish the role of parents. So I write these words with fear and trembling, recognising how utterly crucial the parent’s influence upon a child’s spiritual estate, and how frail we often feel in the face of this awesome responsibility. May God grant us wisdom and grace to equal the weight of our calling.

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