Title: TroubleMakers
Author: Dr. Carla Shalaby
“In school we generally identify the most pleasant, most compliant children as our leaders.”
-Schools are not places where students can be encouraged to practice independent thinking. They want students to conform to the rules, and if they don’t conform, they are labeled. The students from urban areas are suffering the most, and part of this cyclic pattern of getting into trouble, not going to school, committing crimes, and going to jail.
“We cage the birds singing the most loudly.”
-These students are punished for expressing their discomfort with the school environment. They are trapped in a school, like birds in a cage, trying to be free. Free to express their ideas and find themselves.
“Students who do not behave by our standards are then not permitted to progress by our standards.”
Once a child is labeled and cast out of school, they are no longer able to be free and grow. We as a society have failed that child. What because of the standards that were passed down to us and told were the truth?
This author argues that children labeled as troublemakers in schools provide insight into the toxicity that is present there. The schools can almost be labeled as prisons, where students are not free to express themselves but are taught the ideologies of society. If the students do not align with or connect to these ideologies, they may act out; once they do, they are now labeled as a problem or a “troublemaker.” The author challenges us to view these negative behaviors as a cry for help, akin to animal sentinels, indicating that the schools aren’t serving the children as they should. The obedient children just comply and do not complain. However, it's the child who isn’t by the book that dares to express themselves that gives teachers and schools a challenge. These schools aim to produce compliant workers for our society rather than independent thinkers.
To make matters worse, the way we handle these “troublemakers” is wrong. We resolve this by suspending them from schools. We are not fixing the root cause of these issues, and the behaviors will continue. We are setting the child up for failure in school and life. I agree with the author that these troublemakers could be telling us something. I know that in my school, kids are often labeled and get into trouble for skipping class, but are the teachers actively engaging these students? What if we stopped and listened to these “troublemakers,” got their perspectives, and dug deep into what was wrong? Perhaps these are the types of kids who need free rein to express themselves or develop their ideas.
This was an article that hit home for me. My son is labeled as a "troublemaker". It's upsetting to think about how stifled these kids are in such a restrictive environment.
ReplyDeleteYes yes yes. You really "get" shalaby. What could this look like for you as a school nurse, I wonder?
ReplyDelete