Column: Step up, parents
By Scott Walker, M.D.
Dear Neighbors,
Even though we share many values, we all have slightly different priorities among those shared values. Not all values are shared; that’s the “melting pot” for you. Of course, we all feel that our personal system of values is “the best” (or we would change). Those of us who raise children would like to see our children adopt our values and priorities. I haven’t done the research, but I feel this is pretty universal. I quickly and easily conclude that there are many parents in the world and in our own community who have no idea how to teach those values.
A parent’s failure to teach values incurs costs for the community. The young people who have learned some form of The Golden Rule treat their teachers better than those who haven’t. Worse treatment of teachers makes the position harder — and more expensive — to fill.
Does society have the right to teach morals, when we see parents haven’t done the job?
Let’s break it down. When “Respect for others” means “No inappropriate touching,” does the school have the right and authority to teach the moral value of “respect for others?” We know we have the right to enforce moral values after the fact; we have many people in our prisons for some form of “inappropriate touching,” a.k.a. lack of respect for others. Do we empower our schools to teach that value? Or only to enforce it? How about, “Actions have consequences?” Everyone gets along better when everyone understands that. May schools teach it?
What about respect for private and public property? If a child demonstrates a lack of respect for property, may the school punish the misdeed and teach the value? Or do we bar our schools from “teaching values?”
The current lack of civility in public discourse indicates that those who engage in misinformation, crude generalizations, and divisive speech, have not learned enough of the values of respect, equality and liberty. How can we do better for today’s children? Perhaps the Civics curriculum needs more time than we’ve been giving it. Or is it fair to ask more of parents? What would we prefer? To empower schools to teach values when it seems parents have not, or to hold parents accountable for their failure to teach those values?
Thus far it seems we’ve done better at punishment than prevention (see our #1 rank in “Percentage of people incarcerated”), but knowing history means we don’t have to repeat it. Let’s give today’s students better training, to be better citizens in the future than we are today.
