Are we living in a world of cheats?

An interesting, but disturbing, article written by Education Editor Anna Patty appeared in the major Sydney newspaper the Sydney Morning Herald the other day that really made me think about how “out of touch” I am about the virtue of Honesty.

The article is about how some private schools in Sydney have extraordinary levels of students gaining “special consideration” for the major school exam the Higher School Certificate.  The article states “The NSW Board of Studies granted dispensations such as extra time to complete exams, coloured paper, large print and Braille or assistance with handwriting. The claims ranged from students with disabilities and illnesses such as diabetes, to those with unreadable handwriting and sweaty palms.”

The article also says that on average, state public schools have a 6.57% rate of candidates gaining “special consideration”, whereas, at least 25 private schools had rates of double the state average and some schools had over 20% of students with “special consideration”.

Obviously, many students and schools, are being very dishonest in seeking special consideration and the practice is nothing less than cheating. What sort of an example are we setting for our children if it is acceptable for over 1 in 5 families of some schools to be actively dishonest in gaining an advantage for their children?

Maybe I’m being very naive and perhaps the reality is that it is quite commonplace in schools throughout the world to condone this type of behaviour, however, in my opinion it is only encouraging children to think that it is OK to cheat and lie to get ahead rather than rely on hard work and dedication.

I’d love to know what other people think, you can click here to see the article in full, and the great cartoon is by Cathy Wilcox.

Doug Beckers

Obama talks about the virtues

The election win and victory speech by US President elect Barak Obama was a turning point in the way we view the world. His speech talked about many of the things we all strive for such as prosperity, opportunity and peace, and even more inspiring was that he referred to many of the 52 Virtues such as honesty, service, responsibility, humility and determination.

Unity is being different from everyone else but being accepted by a group. Brianna 12

All of the 52 virtues have been interpreted by children at our local primary school at Kincumber on the central coast NSW Australia, by creating artworks around what they believe each virtue means. I’m sure that the children’s interpretations are not that different to what Barak Obama wanted to convey in his speech. Sarah wrote: “Service is giving a favour without asking” something very profound for a 9 year old. Our goal is to have artwork interpretations of the 52 virtues from at least 52 different cultures so a “virtues” movement will be created to help build a better world. Let the process begin!

Doug Beckers