The Tribune editorial of January 30, 2008 spoke very eloquently of the root causes of the lack of discipline in our society. It spoke of an incident last week of 15 high school students being removed from their classroom and sent home for a breech of the dress code. There is another story of a student being sent home but returned the next day in the late Sir Lynden Pindlings' chauffer-driven car.
No one should think that such incidents happen only at Queen's College or the public schools. I am sure that most of us have heard the stories of other private schools when a child has been disciplined and one of the parents has shown up at the school demanding to see the teacher who had the audacity to discipline their child. Then there is the incident of a teacher informing a child that she was to be put on detention and the child said 'I will tell my Daddy", who happens to be a member of the Board, so the punishment was withdrawn.
What a far cry from the days of Rev. "Pop" Dyer at Queens' College when a student was disciplined and the student was afraid that his parents would find out because they would receive the same punishment, or worse, when they arrived home.
Is it reasonable to assume that these are usually the same people who will cheat on their exams because someone will come to their rescue and later, as adults, they will come home from a trip with false invoices or a false declaration. If caught, they will figure on knowing someone in the Customs Department who will "give them a break". These same people will be in the front pew in Church the following Sunday.
One thing just leads to another so we now thave a culture of "tiefing" from employers and I am sure that in most cases they realize that, if caught, it would not be worth the time or money of the employers to take them to Court.
So it just goes on and on and I applaud Queen's College for their action and hope that they will "hold their ground" and that other schools will do the same. The country cannot afford for them to do otherwise.
