Dear Editor,
It is all well and good, even laudable, for Minister Shaik Baksh to express strongly that his ministry will not condone breaches of the rules governing the administration of corporal punishment in the nation’s schools (Stabroek News 22.2.09).
However, all of this mayhem which evolved at the Berbice High School recently, could have been avoided if advice had been taken from the enlightened (when the law was up for amendment) to ban forever the barbarism of corporal punishment (by crypto-sadists and potential sadists hiding in our school system).When will practising educationists and education administrators accept that children cannot learn in an environment of terror and brutalization.
In passing, I should mention that an interesting article on the subject was published in the Guyana Times (23.2.09) highlighting the difference between discipline and punishment.
Yours faithfully,
Dr Steve Surujbally, AA
