Save Our Schools! Save Our Students!

After the Chennai teacher’s killing, I waited a while before writing this article to see how the Indian Society reacts to the teachers’ community. Finally I understood that a teacher is an unresponsive person blamed by everyone, for all the misfortunes that happen in a child’s life.

A teacher is expected to mould the children to perfect human beings, teaching them the lessons, moral, ethical and social values. The character, behaviour, discipline, etc. of all the students are in the teacher’s hands. What parents cannot do for a single child at home, the teacher is expected to do for all the students.

May be in the Indian traditional System of Education, where parents never intervened between the teacher and the taught, there was hope and possibility of the students being trained by the teacher in all spheres of life. Their noble relation was not spoiled by the microscopic judgemental attitude of the public and psychologists. Now, you tie up the teachers’ hands and ask them to mould your children.

Being a teacher, I ask myself now, is it really worth losing my life being a responsible teacher? I wish that teacher had never corrected the boy who murdered her. I wonder if I should call Mrs Uma Maheshwari, who left behind two motherless girls, a fool or a martyr!

Did we hear such crimes happening 30 years back, when we did our schooling, though, in many schools teachers walked into the class with a cane and corrected the students? With just three exams per year, most of the people of our generation are doing well in different fields (They didn’t become birds of the same feather, which flew in the same direction) and I must say that they are emotionally much more stable than this pampered GeNext!

Today, the teacher and the taught are separated by the walls of confusion, pressures and interventions of all kinds, not being able to bond together. All promotion, the crowded class rooms, the very many things which each child has to chat about, and above all, tuitions, are some of the reasons for the students being disconnected from the class and the teacher.

With all the psychologists and experts in the field, none could find an answer nor even understand the problem that the children face. And to everyone’s surprise the suicide rate and crime rate is increasing day by day.

We have lost many years now, by assuming various possibilities and probabilities as reasons for the child’s misbehaviour. Face the fact before it is too late. Unlimited hours of freedom on the phone, TV, internet, etc. will only lead to unlimited problems. You spoil your children in too many ways, letting them have their way, and then take them to doctors and psychologists. When they are depressed enough and lose their interest in everything, you need a person to repair them and to be blamed, and the teacher is always targeted.

After reading about this horrible incident, none of us wants to risk our lives by correcting and disciplining our students. We stand helpless in front of the new demand on us, to train up the children to handle stress!

Give me a break here. A child has died or committed suicide or killed a teacher, because he/ she lacked love and support even at home or in society. As much as there are bad teachers, there are bad parents too. Their busy lives, broken marriages, lack of love, etc. affect their child. We, teachers, never disclose the sad stories that our students confide in us about their homes. Can we ever enter the homes and save our students who are ill-treated by corporal punishment, verbal and in some cases, even sexual abuse by the parent? When the public targets us, please remember that you cannot save the children just by stoning the teachers.

If you want a child to be saved, all the people in his/her life should share the responsibility to support the child with love, understanding and acceptance. The adults should live an exemplary life, based on values and morals, for the kids to follow. All must realise the necessity of correcting a child and to mould him/her as a well-behaved, balanced personality.

Treat children as children, not as future achievers and money makers. Stop pressurising them to bring home super grades for your gratification. Instead, leave them to dream their dreams and pursue them with confidence and enthusiasm. Stop imagining that they are flying in the sky even before you teach them to be grounded in gratitude and love. If we stop the mutual blame game and make sure that we impart values in the children, most of these problems can be solved.

My alma mater, Baker Memorial School, functioned in perfect discipline without a cane or any type of corporal punishment. I remember with gratitude all my wonderful teachers who gave us value-based education and spiritual foundation. My school’s motto “Love Never Fails” is surely the backbone of my success in life.

I encourage the parents and educational managements to stop sandwiching the children from both sides and thereby making criminals out of them. Shouldn’t we reduce their stress more than teaching them to handle the stress that we create in their lives?

The Need of the Hour is to stand in unison with one noble goal, to mould our children into good, strong, responsible and stable human beings by giving them love and corrections in equal measure. A spoiled child will have nothing to look back and thank his parents and teachers for!