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Who Cares About School?
By Dr. Marvin
Berkowitz
When Julie Andrews sang
about “a few of her favorite things,” she didn’t mention
school. This is not surprising. School wouldn’t be most
kids’ first choice for how to spend a large chunk of their
waking hours.
I remember a rather
startling scene from my first few minutes in school. Like
probably most of my peers, I arrived at my first day of
nursery school with great fear and apprehension. One of my
classmates was a bit more honest and direct than most of us
in expressing his feelings about having his mother abandon
him to a room full of strangers. He was standing on his
hands, with his feet kicking against the door, and screaming
at the top of his lungs, while objects poured from his
pockets and mucous flowed from his nostrils. He certainly
got my attention (and that of everyone within earshot -
probably within three or four miles)It was after all an
Olympic-caliber performance.
School is strong stuff, and it can be scary or boring. And
kids’ emotional reactions to school will have an effect on
both how well they do and how they develop. Recent findings
suggest that attachment to school helps keep kids out of
trouble. Those who feel bonded to school are less likely to
engage in risky behaviors such as substance use and
delinquency. This alone is reason enough to want to make
schools less boring and unfriendly. The US spends nearly
half a trillion dollars a year on education, and most kids
still find school boring and uninspiring. Shouldn’t we try
to make schools more user-friendly?
In fact, our schools
(especially our high schools) are perhaps the least evolved
institutions we have. Think about it: just how different is
the structure of school today from when you were a kid? And
did you enjoy going to school as a kid?
Probably not.
Character educators have
come to discover that their effectiveness depends upon
whether kids see their schools as “caring communities.” If
they see the school as a place where people care about each
other (and especially about them) and take care of each
other, then they are more likely to care about others. Kids
also become more likely to sup-port democratic values, to
avoid drugs and other risky behaviors, to want to do well in
school, and to get better grades.
So if we want to keep kids
from losing their cool and their character (not to mention
their pocket change and bodily fluids like my nursery school
classmate), we need to help them bond to school. Schools
need to become more child-friendly places, so kids want to
go to school and see their schools as places where people
care about them.
But, this isn’t the
school’s responsibility alone. Parents need to work hard to
develop and support a “school ethic.”
How? Parents need to be involved in their kids’ education.
They need to monitor and help with homework. They need to
ask kids how their day at school went (even if the answer is
always, “I dunno”). Make a habit of asking about school as
soon as kids get home, and then again during meal time.
Parents need to volunteer to help at school. They need to
read messages from the principal and teacher and to respond
promptly. They should tell kids stories (happy ones) from
when they went to school.
Schools cannot merely be “holding tanks” for our youth. Kids
need to want to attend school, to enjoy school. Then they
can stand competently on their own two feet, rather than
hysterically on their hands.
