By Tazoacha Asonganyi
The end of the year exams have come and gone; now is time to go back to school. How the exhilarating years pass in a twinkle of an eye, interspersed with exciting holidays!
For sure, much time was spent during the holidays watching television. And so, in spite of our best efforts, the hidden "enemy" lurking in television sets got into the vulnerable children without their knowledge. Small wonder that most of them going back to school are likely to be like Socrates’ Athenian youths with "... bad manners, contempt for authority, disrespect for older people ..." and who "... no longer rise when their elders enter their room ... contradict their parents, chatter before company, gobble their food and tyrannise their teachers..."
Many of them upon return to school will engage in the offensive hobby of bullying the young "juniors". In this, the boys tend to be more open, hitting out or taking something from the "junior", so the authorities can see it happen and intervene. But girls are more subtle with their covert and elusive bullying, engaging in systematic and hurtful spreading of nasty stories and social exclusion, which are harder to identify and therefore harder to deal with. No doubt the watchful authorities know all these tricks.
The children are going back to all sorts of schools, good and bad; nursery, primary, secondary or high schools. Those that are high up on leagues like GCE or BAC are by definition good schools where not only the teaching but also the organisation, the discipline, the leadership, the staff and the pupils are likely to be good. At best, the league can identify some of the best schools, but not all of them.
In any case, the best predictor of success in life is not so much the IQ, the number of GCE passes, success in BAC or academic qualifications; it is the emotional intelligence of the child. It is the ability to empathise with others – to share their emotions, thoughts and feelings – to connect with them, so to say. In the final analysis, this is the main determinant of all success: of becoming good parents, good spouses, good citizens. Schools should promote programmes that produce active, responsible and successful citizens instead of obedient, passive and "successful" ones.
A good school trains the entire person, not just the brain. The entire person is what we call character; it is everything. It defines how you act, dictates what you do, and lays your life out for you. Viewed from this perspective, it is schools that fail, not children.
No economic policy can compensate for poor schools because knowledge and skills have always made the difference between national wealth and poverty. Science is useful because it keeps a country competitive. Some societies emphasise the technological side, others like ours the basic sciences, and the wise ones emphasise both. In any case, most societal advances have come from the application of well-established scientific principles; from fundamental sciences rather than the search for specific applications.
Indeed, it was not the entertainment industry in search of new ways of marketing pop music that discovered the transistor; scientists working in different domains of physics did. In science, the greatest achievements cannot be planned and predicted; they result from the unique creativity of particular minds. This is why basic sciences, scientific innovation and application should always be encouraged in our schools through massive funding. The brightest and best scientists should always be identified and aided.
Like for science, artistic talent and genius can also be unplanned, unpredictable and individual. Such talent and genius should be nurtured in our schools through the ingenuity of teachers, club life and other activities common in good schools, and aided too.
All this stress of talent, genius and creativity is not meant to play down the importance of perspiration - sweat, hard work, determination - which is the main factor in all success! Whether it is science, art or technology, the essence is their total mastery. In the end, all the talents and skills and genius gained in school, whatever they are, form a web needed by all successful societies that enjoy life fully.
When I look back at my 5 years in St Joseph College,Sasse-Buea that seem to have marked my life for ever, I remember the heroic efforts of our teachers to get us to understand the several subjects we learned, the discipline they imposed on our youthful spirits, the models they represented for us, their attitudes and behaviours that helped to shape ours. As we look forward as parents to the new school year, this is the least we expect from every school, public or private.
The end of the year exams have come and gone; now is time to go back to school. How the exhilarating years pass in a twinkle of an eye, interspersed with exciting holidays!
For sure, much time was spent during the holidays watching television. And so, in spite of our best efforts, the hidden "enemy" lurking in television sets got into the vulnerable children without their knowledge. Small wonder that most of them going back to school are likely to be like Socrates’ Athenian youths with "... bad manners, contempt for authority, disrespect for older people ..." and who "... no longer rise when their elders enter their room ... contradict their parents, chatter before company, gobble their food and tyrannise their teachers..."
Many of them upon return to school will engage in the offensive hobby of bullying the young "juniors". In this, the boys tend to be more open, hitting out or taking something from the "junior", so the authorities can see it happen and intervene. But girls are more subtle with their covert and elusive bullying, engaging in systematic and hurtful spreading of nasty stories and social exclusion, which are harder to identify and therefore harder to deal with. No doubt the watchful authorities know all these tricks.
The children are going back to all sorts of schools, good and bad; nursery, primary, secondary or high schools. Those that are high up on leagues like GCE or BAC are by definition good schools where not only the teaching but also the organisation, the discipline, the leadership, the staff and the pupils are likely to be good. At best, the league can identify some of the best schools, but not all of them.
In any case, the best predictor of success in life is not so much the IQ, the number of GCE passes, success in BAC or academic qualifications; it is the emotional intelligence of the child. It is the ability to empathise with others – to share their emotions, thoughts and feelings – to connect with them, so to say. In the final analysis, this is the main determinant of all success: of becoming good parents, good spouses, good citizens. Schools should promote programmes that produce active, responsible and successful citizens instead of obedient, passive and "successful" ones.
A good school trains the entire person, not just the brain. The entire person is what we call character; it is everything. It defines how you act, dictates what you do, and lays your life out for you. Viewed from this perspective, it is schools that fail, not children.
No economic policy can compensate for poor schools because knowledge and skills have always made the difference between national wealth and poverty. Science is useful because it keeps a country competitive. Some societies emphasise the technological side, others like ours the basic sciences, and the wise ones emphasise both. In any case, most societal advances have come from the application of well-established scientific principles; from fundamental sciences rather than the search for specific applications.
Indeed, it was not the entertainment industry in search of new ways of marketing pop music that discovered the transistor; scientists working in different domains of physics did. In science, the greatest achievements cannot be planned and predicted; they result from the unique creativity of particular minds. This is why basic sciences, scientific innovation and application should always be encouraged in our schools through massive funding. The brightest and best scientists should always be identified and aided.
Like for science, artistic talent and genius can also be unplanned, unpredictable and individual. Such talent and genius should be nurtured in our schools through the ingenuity of teachers, club life and other activities common in good schools, and aided too.
All this stress of talent, genius and creativity is not meant to play down the importance of perspiration - sweat, hard work, determination - which is the main factor in all success! Whether it is science, art or technology, the essence is their total mastery. In the end, all the talents and skills and genius gained in school, whatever they are, form a web needed by all successful societies that enjoy life fully.
When I look back at my 5 years in St Joseph College,Sasse-Buea that seem to have marked my life for ever, I remember the heroic efforts of our teachers to get us to understand the several subjects we learned, the discipline they imposed on our youthful spirits, the models they represented for us, their attitudes and behaviours that helped to shape ours. As we look forward as parents to the new school year, this is the least we expect from every school, public or private.
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