I used to
arrive early at school. It made me beat the traffic in the morning rush hour and
also provided time to prepare myself for the day.
A morning I
noticed that one of my students is in rugby practice. I was a bit upset, since
the previous day I had asked her to abstain from athletics till she gets a
passing grade in my course.
I had sensed
that she is smart and she can do in the 80s and 90s very easily. She needed
encouragement and support.
I talked to the coach. The coach took the issue to
the PhysEd department. They checked her report card. She was failing ONLY two
courses and according to school policy she was allowed to be in athletic
programs and in the team.
The school
policy was/is that students are allowed to fail two courses out of the four…A
funny policy! In an academic institution, students are allowed to be failures
and a teacher cannot prevent that. I am certain that she could have been
successful in academics. She was a bright student. But instead now she is a
failure and works at minimum wage jobs.
I accuse the
system for her failure.
- · The athletic programs at schools need to be inclusive and open to all students and promote physical well-being.
- · The schools should not be converted to providing players to the professional leagues. That will be contrary to the mission of academic institutions.
- · Academic institutions should be primarily for educating the young and preparing them for life.
- · Having elite athletes and groups will be discriminatory.
- · I am 100% with the idea that athletics should be fun and inclusive. Even if there is competition among teams, it should be in a civilized manner of cooperation and promoting excellence, not competition where it will generate failures in life if the athlete does not make it…
- · Fierce competition corrupts the very concept of education and leads even to violence and abuse of people -female cheerleaders.
- · I definitely agree in promoting excellence and encouraging better players to excel and do even more and better, but even these athletes have to be directed to education.
- · I have always wondered...
- Why there are female cheer leaders for male games and no male cheerleaders for female games? Any excuses or any reason?
***
Schools are failing society in their mission to educate.
Bureaucratic leadership is stifling the inquisitive mind and is catering
to mediocrity.
In the case of the student above, the PhysEd department even ganged up against
me and demeaned themselves by racist comments…
A Catholic institution deserve better.
An academic institution must provide academic excellence and guidance.
Schools should look after the spiritual, academic and physical health of
students entrusted to them.
I had the same experience when I was on the basketball team while at Pocock. There were students on my team that weren't doing well in class but were allowed to continue on the team. As part of the team we had to take a "report card" to our teachers and have them grade us on a scale out of 5 based on attendance, grades etc. Some students got barely passable and failing grades but were allowed to continue based on a promise to get better. These reports were never re-evaluated. In a sense coaches (who were teachers at Pocock) were focused only on the team and not on their players' education.
ReplyDeleteI personally feel compelled to win at everything so to me I would get furious when we would lose and we lost almost every game. This is the same even as I go to "drop in" sessions of football(soccer). I enjoy the competition which I think should not be attached to the education side of things as it can interfere with learning in the sense that students shouldn't feel that they have to compete with others for the best grade in the class. At university I know for sure that if you are getting below a 60% in any course you are not allowed to participate in any inter/outer campus teams at any level. I guess they take (and should take) it more seriously at the university level.
At the high school level I feel that sports teams and after school programs provide a welcomed break from class but there should be a unified emphasis on both academic and sports activities. I also felt that those a part of the sports teams in high school were often more likely to get away with things with teachers (such as skipping, dress code etc).
Thank you for your wonderful insight.
DeleteI know that you will be a good teacher(?).