Choose wisely for your children

Nhamo Muchagumisa
AS the 2015 academic year draws to an end, parents are once again making strenuous effort to raise money for the new academic year ahead. Many are also securing places for their grade 7 graduates while others are obtaining transfer letters for their children.

Parents, however need to choose wisely when it comes to which secondary schools they have to send their children to, yet there are a lot more who are not so much as empowered as to make a choice .It is actually the majority of parents who due to economic reasons just send their children to a school in their immediate environment because anywhere else would be too expensive.

For those parents who have the privilege to choose, the boarding school is the ideal choice .Despite the exorbitant fees ,the environment is healthy for intellectual growth ,what with the positively restrictive environment, the monitored movements ,supervised study routines and the roll calls.

There are however some parents who because they believe that another school a considerable distance away from their immediate environment offers better services than the one nearest to them, send their children away to such a school without thinking seriously about the custody of their children.

Custody, though not so beautiful a word, as it is implies restriction is a very important element in a child’s life. A child who goes to a boarding school spends the term in the custody of the school authorities .

A child who goes to a local day school lives in the custody of his or her parents or guardians. Both environments are welcome in a child’s development.

There are many parents who send their children to far away schools where they rent accommodation .The owners of the rented houses are normally affluent people living in the city ,but own spacious homes in the rural areas. Teenagers from many different families, both boys and girls, sometimes find themselves living in the same house as they go to school.

At the beginning of every term these children carry groceries, clothes and linen to these “havens of intellectual fortune” and the parents never consider the moral consequences.

The issue of custody or safe keeping of children is totally disregarded as the children enjoy excessive freedom, engaging in love affairs ,not only among themselves ,but with outsiders who take advantage of the non restrictive environment.

The children in such “bush” boarding ‘schools’ are also exposed to the temptation of drug and alcohol abuse due to the absence of an adult’s monitoring eye .If something suddenly goes wrong the parents blame everything possible ,including witchcraft or evil spirits ,never allowing reason to prevail and taking stock of what they would have chosen for their children.

Most boarding schools, if not all, have banned students from bringing nestle Cerevita or corn flakes into school because the said food stuffs can be fermented into an alcoholic beverage, dangerous experiment! What will prevent a juvenile who has no authority above him or her to control his or her actions after school from doing something worse?

Parents should send their children to schools where the environment is friendly not only for intellectual development, but also for social and moral development as well.

Nhamo Muchagumisa is a trained secondary school teacher and holds a degree in English and Communication Studies. He can be reached on cell 0777 460 162 or email [email protected].