Values education is the way to go

Within recent times, various newspapers have been reporting on the increasing incidents of crime in Trinidad and Tobago, with contributors of articles hypothesising about the causes of our current slippage into the world of criminal behaviour, and it seems to be the consensus that some of the main causes are — unemployment, increasing numbers of single parent homes, the absence of role models and peer pressure. Quite recently, it was announced by a Government official that our young people were the greatest offenders in the current crime wave — a disclosure which certainly points a finger at the quality of the nurturing and educational practices of both parents and professional educators. On the other hand, one may also claim that crimes have been perpetrated in this country, for which there seems to be no justifiable causes: prompting speculation, that such a phenomenon might be due to failure on the part of the perpetrators to resolve their inner and interpersonal conflicts, by means, other than resorting to violence of one type or another.

It seems to be a very justifiable assumption that when young people go astray, it is not always that they are influenced by depressive economic conditions in their environment, because it can also be that they are confronted by the problem of having to choose either obeying or rebelling; and there are people who will choose to rebel only because they want to prove their independence, and to establish the fact that they are not the obedient “little ones.” It is the kind of behaviour that reflects how they were brought up, and what they have grown to believe; which is, that their way is the right way; and of course all efforts to convince them that they are wrong, will end up being acts of futility. But this must not be allowed to frustrate the more experienced members of our various communities as they go about setting good examples, for not unlike citizens of other parts of the world, we have a responsibility to offer them as much guidance as possible, especially by the examples we set.

Of course, while it is believed that there are two primary instincts in man — the aggressive instinct and the social instinct  —and that while the social instinct triumphs over the aggressive, there are certain types of people among us who explode and stampede. In Trinidad and Tobago, we have to deal with two categories of delinquents — those who, it is assumed, are affected by psychological problems arising out of their struggles to establish their self-image, which is that they want to be seen, heard and respected in a manner that suits their ego. The other category constitutes older and more experienced individuals who are disgusted with their current status in life, and will at the slightest provocation or frustration switch lanes and become murderers, bandits, arsonists, and kidnappers for it is well known that aggression is purely a reaction to frustration.

The Government’s answer to this has been in the nature of a more aggressive police force and police presence, more vehicles, more stringent laws and better organised patrols. In addition, there are presumptive indications that the technology of crime detection and solution have come to the assistance of the police, and is expected to boost their efficiency in the execution of the task before them. All these are extremely important improvements introduced by the authorities, for which they must be highly commended. Nonetheless, these innovations are known as short-term measurers, and while they are quite suitable for the immediacy of our needs, they represent only one component of what our assault on crime must be.

The other component should be an educationally oriented one and without casting aspersions on the efficacy of a short-term programme, one must insist that serious thought should be given to designing a long-term strategy, which is enduring and inexpensive, which does not call for thousands and thousands of military personnel patrolling the streets of this country by day and by night or for extensive prison facilities, manned by a multitude of prison officers. What we need, is a strategy that will imbue our young people with a code of ethics to live by, and with the understanding on our part that the results will not be immediately automatic. It is very well known that people who act morally are those who know what they are doing and that the values they believe in are not physical values, by standards of polite behaviour, and this is where the teachers in our society all have an incontrovertible role to play.

Unfortunately, however, there are many teachers who believe that the question of values is not the domain of the classroom teacher and that the subject of values fits most appropriately into the domain of parents, relatives, the church and non-governmental organisations. But, these teachers do not recognise that their very job implies the teaching of values, such as the statements they make from day to day, the way they dress, their classroom activities, the examination papers they set, as well as their general conduct. All these suggest that they believe that certain ideas and events are more important than others, for their students’ consideration. Teachers must accept the fact that incidental teaching, as effective as it might be, is not enough and that they need to shift the emphasis on the teaching of social studies from the cognitive to the affective domain and insist on the idea that “Values should be taught, not caught.” There is no doubt, that it is now a matter of logical necessity, that we emerge from their current crisis, by imbuing our young people with principles of ethical behaviour.

I recall that in a recent publication it was disclosed that a sum of money amounting to one thousand, two hundred dollars was lost. Subsequently, the money was found by one who choose to entrust it to the police. The police in turn succeeded in identifying the owner to whom the money was returned. Sometime later a Government Minister accompanied by a police officer presented a collection of Christmas gifts, purchased at a cost equal to the sum of money retrieved  and presented it to the finder, all in recognition of the sense of honesty he displayed. But this citizen’s sense of value did not originate with this incident. It could be just one of the cadre of attributes which constitute his character, the formation of which began from his early childhood. And this reminds one of a statement by John Dewey that “If we eliminate the social factor from the child we are left with an abstraction.”