What I see these days when I read articles on education is that it seems that today’s parent of an elementary school child is perhaps a little more volatile than what I was used to. I’m commenting from afar here as I am retired, but there seems to be a growing desire on the part of parents to exercise control over what teachers actually teach their children. They feel strongly that it is their right. People today seem to spend a goodish amount of time discovering, collecting, cataloguing, and enumerating to all within hearing range exactly what rights they have. The more it seems, the merrier.
I am reminded of the pointed bumper sticker from the 1980s - He who dies with the most toys wins. Perhaps there has sprung up some kind of unspoken competition in the 2020s in which the word “rights” is substituted for “toys”. Perhaps it is merely a passing fever that will abate when people become overwhelmed with the hard work of exercising and enforcing their rights.
Needless to say it didn’t use to be this way. In fact, the playing field was tipped too strongly in the opposite direction when I began my career. Parents entrusted their child to a school and a set of teachers over the years and basically hoped things would work out. Teachers were highly respected and the principal of a school occupied a position on the parent’s mental hierarchy just beneath God. It was completely common to meet with parents only twice a year at parent-teacher interview time. Other meetings were rare accidents, just as one might meet the postman occasionally as he was doing his rounds.
This was not a good thing. In an era in which corporal punishment was still fully in force, teachers were often not questioned of their use of it. The parent assured his children that he subscribed to the hoary old chestnut, “If you get it at school, you’ll get it twice as hard when you get home.”
There was the occasional grim result. Once, the principal of a school I was student teaching at, was made aware that a snowball with a rock in it had been thrown and broken a school window. This principal was a nun who had been around the block and didn’t like to be thwarted by mere children.
Six hulking suspects, all in Grade 8 were brought in to her office. Being in Grade 8 in those days carried an age that might range from 11 to 17. Some children skipped a year. Many more failed once or multiple times. Mr. M, the vice-principal, was there to supply the muscle. I was there because he thought I should see the full spectrum of being a teacher, I guess.
Sister Loretta stood in turn before each of the boys and asked, “Did you throw the snowball that broke the window?” Each boy denied it. At the end of this ritual, she turned to her VP and said, “Mr. M, strap all of the boys once on each hand, please”. He did so.
Once again, she walked the line of boys. They were definitely paler and twitchy. Again, she asked the same question. Each boy denied the act, some in sullen tones, some in quavering voices. “Mr. M, once again please. A little firmer”. There was a deathly silence for an instant, which was broken by the hiss of the strap. Some of the boys cried out. I was horrified.
“Gentlemen, do any of you have anything to say now? If not, we will continue. I have no obligations more important than this, and I have sent a teacher to be in Mr. M’s class until he can return. We can resume, or my question can be answered.”
Two boys, their faces now red and weepy, stole a sidelong glance at one of their number. The same one. Sister Loretta was on him like a cat. “Jimmy, the boys seem to be trying to communicate with you. Do you have anything to say - now? I’ll not wait longer, you know.”
The deathly silence returned. That moment was the single worst in my career. And I wasn’t getting strapped. Then, to my relief, Jimmy croaked, “I didn’t mean to. Honest”. The principal stared at him for a few seconds, her face creased in a shockingly beatific smile. “Gentlemen”, she said softly, “you may all return to class. Jimmy, you will phone home now and tell your mother this whole story. I will let them deal with it from here.”
His parents would of course pay for the window’s replacement. No doubt they would be less than pleased with their son. They almost certainly would contact the school to apologize. None of the innocent five would tell the story at home.
This was abuse. That principal should have been fired and perhaps should have faced the law. For her, it was all done in the name of the Lord. I’m sure she slept well that night.