The Ethics of Discipline

I recently spent a day as a facilitator at Ethics in Business, an event for high school juniors and seniors organized by the San Diego Regional East County Chamber of Commerce.  This event is dear to my heart because ethics communicates two key worldview foundations that will make or break a life: 1. You matter because you have been created with intrinsic worth, and 2. Consequently, you are accountable for who you choose to be and what you choose to do.  Our inherent value as a person is affirmed by accountability.  When we as an Education Community (not CVUSD in particular) stop holding our students, our staff, or even each other as Board members accountable, we are essentially saying, "You don't matter enough."

These core beliefs about human dignity are foundational to our work as a District and a community that cares about its young people.  I believe the following controversial statement needs to be said from the perspective of an experienced educator and parent: in an effort to make education more "accessible," the reality is we have devalued it by minimizing accountability in our schools.  More importantly, it's hurting our young people who are struggling, other students around them, our staff, and our entire community.  I understand many of these issues are legislated by the state of California, with good intentions, but without consideration of truth. Following so-called "experts" has lead us down a moral, philosophical, and empirical dead-end.  We have communicated standards and ideals with empty words, but have lost the hearts of our students.  To put this in practical terms, great teachers and parents have always used restorative practices alongside punitive discipline.  As we operate in loco parentis, we have to draw from the observation that good parents utilize effective punitive consequences in addition to restorative techniques, successfully saying, "I care about you too much to set you up for failure." 

The reality is that restorative practices coupled with consistent and reasonable punitive consequences communicate that education, both for individual & those around them, is worth defending.  In addition to hurting the young person who is struggling to make good choices, abandoning punitive consequences also compromises education for other students in the classroom, a complaint I have heard often.  Even more, the current disciplinary structure has become a huge burden for teachers.  It is often the number one cited cause for teacher burnout: "working conditions", which is headlined by student behavior, and can be seen in our LCAP Metric 1.7.  It's true that punitive consequences challenge our students, families, staff, and community to evaluate what wrap-around services will truly help our students reach their full potential.  However, this two-pronged approach builds value in our students and in education. 

In summary, as a society, we are saddened by the epidemic of depression, loneliness, lack of social skills and work ethic among our young people.  Sure, some of that is because our culture has abandoned our children to technology and media.  But it's primarily because we've repeatedly said with our rhetoric, "you matter,” but repeatedly demonstrated with a lack of accountability that they don't.