You’ve heard of the ugly Singaporean. Now meet its cousin—the
ugly Singaporean parent.
Demanding, unreasonable and self-righteous, this new breed of
parents have an overbearing sense of entitlement.
They expect nothing less than the best triple A-care for their
child in school, and woe befall any teacher that doesn’t match
up.
Often displaying a warped sense of what is wrong and right,
these pushy parents come down hard on any educator who dares mess
with their kid, even if the latter is wrong.
“Haircut mum” has thrown the spotlight on both the kinds of
demands placed upon educators and the sky-high expectations of
parents.
To recap, Serene Ong filed a police complaint after a Unity
Primary school teacher re-trimmed her boy’s S$60 haircut despite
several warnings by the school to keep his hair tidy.
“There is absolute no right or wrong in this matter,” said Madam
Ong, after her son’s case was highlighted by Education Minister
Heng Swee Keat at an education seminar recently.
One might say the above example demands a re-look at current
school rules and discipline. What, for example, does it matter if a
student’s hair “covers his ears” or “touches his collar”? But
that’s for another day.
What’s more frightening is the sense of entitlement some parents
have.
Consider these.
A teacher at a government-aided mixed school in the East told
Yahoo! Singapore a parent of her Sec 3 pupil tried to pay her extra
money to focus more on her son in class.
“When I told her ‘no’, she said she would complain that I had
neglected his progress and ask that he be put in another class,”
she said.
Another teacher, 37, who has been teaching over a decade,
recounted how she had let slip in class that she was a Tampines
Junior College alumni.
“The next thing I knew, parents of three girls had written in to
the principal to say that I was not fit to teach at the school and
they wanted me transferred out,” she said.
“I was so hurt and angry. The parents only want teachers from
brand-name schools teaching their brand-name children,” she
added.
A former teacher with 27 years’ experience shared how a parent
had demanded that his daughter be allowed to eat anytime of the
day, claiming that she had a gastric problem. He filed a police
report against her art teacher and wrote letters to the Prime
Minister and senior management at MOE when
she was not allowed to eat in the art room.
In a separate instance, she also recounted how a parent
volunteer filed a report with the MOE to
investigate the school for misappropriating resources when her son
didn’t receive drinks donated by another parent at a school
cross-country run.
So who are these pushy parents exactly?
Several educators we spoke to said they’re likely to be
university-educated, well-to-do and stay in private housing.
What kind of society and what kind of human beings are we
raising our kids to be?
Our education blogger, Daniel Wong, recently wrote that parents
cannot shirk the responsibility of raising their own children and
instilling in them the right morals and values.
“Are you an excellent role model for your child? Do you show
respect and honour for everyone you interact with, regardless of
their social status? Are you always in control of your
emotions?”
I couldn’t agree more.
from yahoo
