The disregard for spiritual leaders and counsellors in schools has resulted in a kind of “evil” that’s caused a deterioration of the school system akin to a crocodile waiting for its prey in murky waters.
School Management Association of Fiji president Govind Singh said the removal of the talatala from schools had created a situation in which a national moral awakening was essential if parents were to become more involved with their children.
He cited the case of parents giving their children drugs to sell. “So who are we raising? Are we raising human beings?” Mr Singh asked.
“Now, the crocodile is biting us,” he said.
“We have different faith-based organisations running their schools, so make some allowance for that too.
“They remove the talatala who were being paid by the grant at one point in time, and they said, ‘No, you don’t need that. You want to get somebody to put them into some religious perspective, you pay your own’.
“So, who are we raising? Are we raising human beings? Then the government took out the counsellors. Instead of enriching and empowering people to deal with the situation, they say there will be one district counsellor.”
Mr Singh said schools had thousands of students and needed a full-time counsellor.
He said there were calls to reinstate corporal punishment, but this was not the solution to the problem.
Mr Singh said children were not born bad but went through an adverse personal or family experience that caused a change in behavior.
These children needed assistance, not punishment.
“Your jam-packed classes in urban centers of 40, 50 students do not allow one teacher to deal with 50 different types of children. Some children have dyslexia.
“They have learning disability of one form or the other. They need a separate form of assistance. Do you have some specialist teachers?
“If you go to New Zealand, students who are left behind, there is a special class for that. A specialist will come and take their class so that sooner or later, they can catch up with the rest. Do we have that system here?
“Why aren’t we talking about that system here?”
He said there was a need to have a unilateral reform of the education sector.
