GOOD REASON TRIUMPHS

SINCE the Europeans introduced formal education in our country, this system of education has undergone various reforms in terms of course content and structure, duration of courses and the like.
The implementation of such reforms has always had some side effects. A prominent side effect of the educational reform implemented from the 2007/08 academic year has been the protestations from various quarters against striking out of Religious and Moral Education from the basic school curriculum.
We have not forgotten the outcry of various religious organisations such as the Catholic Bishops Conference and the particular statement by the Bishops that “sidelining religion and morality from education is tantamount to condemning the human person to a lack of means to develop himself or herself fully to be a human being in the society”.
We cannot but agree with the Bishops that it takes morality to avoid doing the wrong thing and that the benefits of doing the right thing are enormous as society seeks to develop and progress.
Happily, the government has listened to reason and decided that Religious and Moral Education as a subject should be reintroduced to the basic school curriculum from September 2008.
Is Religious and Moral Education as a subject the magic wand for conjuring good behaviour in our children? Is there not anything stronger than the absence of Religious and Moral Education from our school curriculum which is undermining the moral upbringing of our children, and for that matter the moral fibre of our society?
Do we, as a nation, have any “moral blueprint” that we expect our people to abide by?
These are questions which should preoccupy all reasonable Ghanaians till we see a change for the better in the behaviour of our people.
Times were when the whole community was a check on the behaviour of every single member.
Some of us have not forgotten the strict discipline that other adult members of our communities subjeted us to, besides our own parents, and our pleadings to other adults not to inform our parents and guardians of our unruly behaviour, all in order to avoid another punishment for the same misbehaviour.
There were times when the school-community relationship was such that “bad children” were sent to the school to be disciplined.
Today, the idea of human rights has been misconstrued and misinterpreted to the extent that some people think they have every right on earth to do whatever they deem right because somebody tells them other people’s rights end where their noses begin. They forget that rights go with responsibilities
It is time the corporate entity Ghana ensured that its institutions of state charged with the responsibility of ensuring good behaviour among the people worked to the letter.
The National Commission on Civic Education (NCCE) should, for instance, educate the people on their rights but it should stress the need for morality.
The home and the community should augment the efforts of the school at training the child in good morals.
To this end, members of the community should avoid assaulting teachers who discipline undisciplined children.
The Ghana Education Service guidelines for disciplining or correcting schoolchildren should be made known to even members of the school community so that they can help to develop them.
Ghana cannot afford the laissez-faire and permissive society we have today.
There is the need to combine tradition with modernity when it comes to morality in our country in order to avoid the ever-growing indiscipline in our society, which the mere teaching of Religious and Moral Education cannot resolve.