A Letter to Teachers

Dear,
Teachers

You may think that children are defiant right now. That their behavior problems are extenuated. In the 1970s and 80s, it wasn't uncommon for teachers and students to smoke cigarettes together in certain designated areas. It wasn't uncommon for lunch periods to serve good food. It wasn't uncommon for the youth to wander the halls during class time, without reproach. There were no cops wandering the schools. Kids never really took classwork seriously---it's true. The workload was less burdensome, and the concepts were easier to understand.

The real issue, is zero tolerance policies and the pressuring force submitted on students. There is constant pressure from the school and parents and social media. Not to mention, the iPhones are extenuating the behavioral problems---there are behavioral problems, I know. I just want to outline that it isn't much different. Save with Covid lockdowns and everything, the schools are getting more oppressive and the students are bursting. Rather, it wasn't uncommon for students to wander hallways, bring drinks into the classroom, use vending machines---etc, etc, etc. As, taking away these stress relievers has created an atmosphere of oppression. Students at 15 are practically on the burgeons of adulthood, and need freedom. They also need discipline.

This is the real problem. As the schools clamped down on our freedoms---in high school---I became more defiant. I'm much like the Gen-Z kids, in that I had a computer all throughout high school, so I'm kind of a progenitor of the Gen-Z. I think, more than likely, they will calm down with age, seek out the education they didn't get in school, search out truths and become more conservative once their bad behavior becomes apparent. As, people need to fail and be knocked down before they can ever know they have to get up.

I agree that they are misbehaving. I agree, to the point that the solution isn't burdening them with more rules. Rather, the students who want an education will stay in the classroom, if teachers showed respect to the students and had command over the discipline, the students would not overreach.

One in authority has to know how to maintain that authority. And they have to do it fairly, and justly. Making kids wear masks in school, telling them to get vaccinated, taking out vending machines and foods that taste good from the cafeteria, zero tolerance on physical altercations between students, policing students when they're out in the hallways, having armed cops in the schools, overbearing homework assignments, a lot of this is the reason schools are losing control over kids. And it has to do with the parents, also, not disciplining them. 

Rather, corporal punishment needs to be accepted again, and parents need to be allowed to discipline their children. And innocuous offenses like not doing homework, walking in the halls, smoking cigarettes, etc. etc. etc., need not be occasions for punishment. Bullying, harassing, flagrant disobedience or disrespecting authority ought to be occasions for a process where the students will be sent to the principle's office---up until about high school, when expulsion or suspension is necessary---and beaten with a ruler. As, this instills in the child a respect for discipline, and it builds in the child a sense of respect and character. Not abusively, as this mandate needs to go through a vetting process and not be used in every case, but the schools need to allow more freedom and allow corporal punishment. Those two things will create safer school environments, and will lighten the burden off teachers. As, students need to feel unconstrained in the school environment, and they also need to be instilled a fear and awe of respect for teachers, that real punishments can be delved out against them if they fail to comply.