tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3697346330292757999.post271229443740546001..comments2023-06-10T14:26:15.957+01:00Comments on Staffordshire: NSPCCMairehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00516412983740136098noreply@blogger.comBlogger2125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3697346330292757999.post-10334689730716725562009-02-28T22:16:00.000+00:002009-02-28T22:16:00.000+00:00'I didn't fulfil my role as prefect but al...'I didn't fulfil my role as prefect but all the while I felt acutely ashamed that I seemed unable to buy into the system.'<BR/><BR/>I think this sort of confusion is an intentional result of such a system, and is especially effective if you are a sensitive and caring person.<BR/><BR/>Certainly it took me a long time to sort my head out after I left school, and yes I think you did what you could in the circumstances, and at the very least prevented someone who had swallowed the rotten system whole from wearing your badge. <BR/><BR/><BR/>At my son's admittedly much better secondary school(no uniform, and on the whole respect for the child and the parent) they created houses and allocated the children to them then asked them to work for the glory of the house. <BR/><BR/>My son could definately articulate his feeling of being bX*&@ if he was going to work for a group he had not chosen to belong to and for a system he fundamentally disagreed with and left the school in no doubt about his feelings. <BR/><BR/>My children have always been permitted to talk to me about anything and express their opinion honestly, not something I experienced. I have also been honest about my opinion of some in authority and fought their corner in the school environment. By home educating my last child, something she pleaded for, I have I hope even more powerfully supported their right to their own opinion and their own choice.<BR/><BR/>Maybe in allowing our children a voice and not letting petty authority silence us we will make a difference, and they will make a greater one. <BR/><BR/>We are not very far distant from a time when authority was almost worshiped, my 82 year old mother will bow to any authority however petty or riduculous, she is absolutely terrified of being told off, despite the fact that she has a first class degree and was head of infants at the school she taught at.<BR/><BR/>Our kids will be very different.<BR/><BR/>So speil away, i have many speil at the tip of my fingers too. <BR/><BR/>No school is not a good place to learn about ethics nor about a lot of other things.<BR/><BR/>I really enjoy reading your blog by the way.Mairehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00516412983740136098noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3697346330292757999.post-73400113175038305042009-02-28T15:36:00.000+00:002009-02-28T15:36:00.000+00:00"The thing is there are no otherchildren just indi..."The thing is there are no otherchildren just individual children who could all have neglect of their needs and difficulties justified and dismissed as unimportant when compared to the good of the imaginary otherchildren, for which you may read, the convenience of the school."<BR/><BR/>I agree with you so furiously, it almost hurts.<BR/><BR/>And as to the moral development of children in schools - no wonder they are so often so muddled about how it really works. <BR/><BR/>To take your example, how can a child honestly act as proper representative of an institution that they have not freely chosen to represent, and which will often directly contradict a child's own nascent standards of morality?<BR/><BR/>I was elected a prefect of a school whose approach to discipline appalled me even then, even without being able to formulate an argument as to why it was so awful. I would now describe it as being appallingly oppressive, almost all-encompassingly coercive and as such, it acted as a break on any proper growth of knowledge. <BR/><BR/>However I wouldn't have been able to explain this, let alone actually do anything very constructive about it at the time. Instead I just shut down. As far as I possibly could, I didn't fulfil my role as prefect but all the while I felt acutely ashamed that I seemed unable to buy into the system.<BR/><BR/>I now think that short of handing back my tie and badge, I did as much as I possibly could have done. I only wish I had walked, but have largely forgiven myself in this regard, not least as I was largely a lone voice at the time. <BR/><BR/>It does seem though that I am no longer alone. I opened a recent school mag to find that the head girl from the year above mine who had apparently bought completely into the system, and who applied the disciplinary regime with gusto, has issued a retraction and admitted along with other girls who have written similarly elsewhere, that the place was AWFUL...no different from a prison camp in many ways. No privacy, no rights to see parents, having to do as you are told 24/7, and don't you dare walk out with your coat buttons undone or wear anything other than the regulation pants!<BR/><BR/>Sorry...that spiel is always on the tip of my fingers, but you are the first to get it Maire. Apologies.<BR/><BR/>All in all, school isn't a good place to learn about ethics.Carlottahttps://www.blogger.com/profile/12686469871331093679noreply@blogger.com