Education – A time and place for everything

National Remembrance Day, half mast, PM and ministers’ condolence messages, support from friends and relatives, kind words, all these meant nothing to the parents that were flown all the way to Kota Kinabalu to identify the bodies of their children and to bring them home, lifeless. This is a tragedy that cannot be described in words. The loss is devastating to the parents and loved ones.
 
Would anyone, any school, wish to continue with such a programme for their 12 year olds or 16 year olds? What is the role and function of a school, a primary school, a secondary school? Is leadership training part of the curriculum, a responsibility of the schools?
 
There is a time for everything, a time to be a child, go to school, be a playful teenager, NS, tertiary education, get a job, settle down and start a family. Schools should not over extend themselves to do things that are beyond their scope of responsibility. Sending children overseas for whatever educational activities should not be the function of primary and secondary schools. Leadership training at 12 is a farce! Go and do well in the PSLE first. Leadership training in an overseas trip is a bigger farce! 2 years in NS may not make any difference in making leaders of NS men. Challenging the 12 year olds to their limits is high falutin. No need to say more.
 
The MOE must re examine the role of education at different levels and keep the eager beavers under control. It is good to want to conquer the world, to be the best of everything. But do it at a proper time. Do not try to over achieve and go astray with fallacious activities not suitable or appropriate for the different age groups. There is no need to prove beyond what the schools are set out to do. Going the extra mile is always good if done within limits and without endangering the safety of the children.
 
Educators are expected to be professionals and to know the limits of what they can do and should do and what is unnecessary and superfluous. Do not expose the educators to do things that they would regret for the rest of their lives. No amount of kind words can bring back the children that were lost. The parents would live a life of painful memories and regrets of their loved ones prematurely taken from them. Can you imagine the grief?
 
I am lost for words to console the victims’ families. The loss of lives is so unnecessary. We don’t have earthquake but have so many earthquake victims to mourn and a day of remembrance for it. So unnecessary.