Let's Do The Right Thing

Our son, Steve who teaches high school has approximately 200-students in his combined classes this school year. His school district evidently keeps track of total behavior-referrals during every student's tenure in the school district. Steve posed this question: How many total referrals do you think these (200) high school students have amassed? I thought for a moment and offered the guess, 5,500. He responded, "How did you get so close? The actual total is 5,210." This scenario is found in all public schools.

The circumstance is all about 'discipline.' Taught discipline, which is NOT BEING TAUGHT. The do-right behavior erosion begins in the home with impotent parenting and it gains momentum with many teachers electing the easy way out from confrontational-mentoring. (Let's clarify the phrase 'confrontational mentoring.') As a parent and a teacher, I felt a responsibility to confront wrong doing and or behavior that could be harmful to my child or the student at my charge. In plain words, I refused to ignore bad behavior and most often chose to handle discipline problems myself rather than refer it to an administrator who had no relationship with my student and would likely suspend a marginal-student who could not afford to miss school. This refusal by teachers to engage and truly attempt mentoring and counseling is a profoundly missed opportunity.

In defense of teachers, I will contend that most parents deal the teachers a bad 'playing-hand.' During my elementary school days, my father always told me the first day of the new school year, "Boy, don't do anything at school that would cause me to miss work and have to come up there to talk with your teacher." It resonated because I remember once as a young boy sassing mother and when my father got home from work he gave me three whacks on the ass with his belt. I never forgot that and never got a referral. My parents made life easier for my teachers.

Those parenting lessons continued in my sports life. My father told me that teammates don't like  a goldbrick; a teammate who shirks responsibility. He also told me, "Don't complain. If you don't like your situation then do something to change it." I guess that's why, as my son's basketball coach, I  threw him out of practice one night for not 'doing right. It got his attention and his teammates' attention.