It was alarming to read of the results of a recent study carried out by the Teacher’s Union of Ireland in which 1050 teachers in fifty-eight public sector schools were surveyed.  Half of the group of teachers surveyed believe that indiscipline is now a serious problem and is having major effects on teachers’ morale.  One third of teachers reported unacceptable verbal abuse by students and over one-fifth reported experiencing threatening and intimidating behaviour by students.  An equally disturbing finding was that one in twelve teachers is experiencing sexual innuendo and harassment from students.  The assumption here is that it is female teachers who are principally experiencing this.  Given that the majority of teachers are female, there is an urgent need to address this issue, as well as the other appalling situations.  The question that certainly arises is how come a high percentage of students are operating from such an immature and threatening place? 

There is nothing that focuses the mind more powerfully than tragedy.  When the tragedy involves children or adolescents, it becomes all the more compelling for parents, teachers and the collective of health professional and politicians to closely examine what could possibly lead to a child attempting to take his own life or for a teenager to end his own life?  The Greek philosopher is quoted as saying ‘a life unexamined is a life not worth living’!  It is equally true to say that ‘an untimely death unexamined is a death that has no meaning.’  It is such a traumatic and painful time and the sensitive timing of such an examination is crucial.  Nonetheless, it does no service to the young person’s sad passing, to those who are left behind to grieve, to other young people and to other families, to not pursue an understanding of the tragic event.

There is a famous Eastern saying that says ‘As soon as you begin to believe in something, then you can no longer see anything else.’  In other words, the truth you believe in and cling to renders you unavailable to hear anything new.  The implication here is that holding onto beliefs limits our experience of life.  There is no suggestion here that beliefs or ideas are a problem; what does give rise to problems is the stubborn attitude of having to have things be a particular way or ‘that you’re right and everybody else is wrong’ or holding relentlessly onto certain beliefs or aggressively insisting that others should see only your way.

Monday will bring a New Year in and probably give rise to some individuals making New Year resolutions.  There will be a fervent determination to ‘beat the flab’, ‘give up the fags’, ‘keep the cool’, ‘balance my lifestyle’, ‘keep fit’ and so on.  Such resolutions don’t tend to last beyond the first week, if not day, of the New Year.

Many adults talk about the need for young people ‘to be more responsible’, possibly without reflecting on what is the true nature of responsibility.

There are two aspects to being responsible, one is the owning of your every feeling, thought, word and action and, second, having the response-ableness to follow through on your responsibilities.  Response-ableness is not generally associated with being responsible, but how can any person who does not possess essential emotional, social and other life skills possibly be responsible in these areas of functioning.  Whereas the nurturing of children is now more commonly accepted as critical to a child’s security, the enablement of children can be missed as being equally important.