Education: Whose fault is it anyway?

2007-12-25 Blog

Education: Whose fault is it anyway?

Well, it's Christmas day. I'm home alone. Josh Groban has been singing "You Raise Me Up" for quite a while. My plan worked quite nicely.

Education. I probably shouldn't mention it. However, to give you a context, I will tell you that I have sat on both sides of the desk in elementary and secondary education.


Whose fault is it?

Who shall we blame for the success of A students. I cast my vote for a photo finish with 2 candidates just nosing out the third.

In third place by a whisker are all of Suzie's or Tyrell's or Abdi's or ... or ... Ryung Hee's teachers.

I actually taught a student named Ryung Hee once. She was one of the most pleasant, hard-working, well-adjusted, ..., intelligent scholars that I ever had the privilege of teaching. I am sure that Ryung Hee is making a meaningful contribution to society somewhere -- as a mother, teacher, doctor, professor, ... whatever her heart desired.

I am not saying that carpenters and nurses do not make meaningful contributions to society. My late father, a carpenter par excellence and my mother, a retired nurse gave my sister and me an incredible genetic head start.

But they did a lot more than that.

[I know that one should never start a sentence with a conjuction.]

Mommy & Daddy taught us. We were both reading long before we started school. I can still remember my old slate board. Showing my age now. I'm 50 years young. When I start using my mom's snow blower (rather than the shovel), I'll be 50 years old.

I digressed.

James Daniel Bailey (a.k.a. Boysie) and Julia Icilda (née Davy) Bailey placed an extremely high value on education. They didn't expect our teachers to do THEIR job. They sent us to school equipped with more than just paper, pencils, a ruler and an eraser.

They sent us to school. Correction. I am sure that they accompanied us to school with a head full of knowledge (including the 3 R's), a love for and unquenchable thirst for knowledge and most importantly, the belief that, "I can do it."

I can achieve anything that I set out to do it. They showed us by example what a man and a woman can achieve if hard work is their friend, integrity and dependability are you know what I mean.

It's too early in the morning -- Christmas morning at that to be waxing poetic.

Time to call all of those family members that I haven't talked to for a long time and to visit some of those old church members and long time family friends and neighbours (in my boyhood neighbourhood) who each contributed in tangible and intangible ways to making me the man that I am today.

I only blame for my positive achievements (including my parents). I take full responsibility for 100% of my missteps.

Thank God for second chances (and third and fourth ...).

Oh yes. Back to our race.

I believe that it was a dead heat. Mom and Dad (these days, frequently Mom and/or Dad) tied their scholar as they crossed the finish line.

It takes a team to raise a village (or something like that).

HB

My entry into the blogosphere

23h03 on Dec. 8, 2007.

My very first blog entry in my very first blog.


Several months ago, I read part of

WanderingScribe

http://wanderingscribe.blogspot.com

It was an amazing story.

It really does not take too much for one to "fall off the rails"/one's life to get derailed.
I applaud her. She got her life back on track. Her blog has become a book.