Education and Complaints....(Re: Cultural Differences and examinations.)

[Scott]

No: HPFGUIDX 2525

EDUCATION

Simon Wrote-"The British education system tries to help those who 
want to help themselves. If, as a student, you want to do nothing 
then the teachers quite often give up on you and move onto someone 
who appreciates the help they are being given."

Simon Also wrote-"This type of behaviour (I am talking about Snape to 
begin with), as long as it does not go too far, does a lot more good 
than harm. It teaches someone how to stand up to, but react entirely 
in an appropriate manor, towards a superior."

Well, that certainly isn't quite so in the US. Example: Last year I 
had a teacher (the subject was band) who began to exclude certain 
members of the organisation simply to allow more room for the new 
kids who were favoured by his wife.  A lot of the people, I being one 
of the ostracized ones, were very upset.  There was in reality no 
reason to exclude certain groups. Immediately there were some parents 
that went to complain to the school board and to the principal about 
the alleged injustice.  I however specifically asked that my parents 
NOT complain.  After all the row that was going on was between us 
(the students) and the teacher, who was in no way invading personal 
boundries, both physical and emotional (though the latter could be 
argued) had technically done nothing wrong.  The parents were simply 
upset at the prinicple that their child was being told they were "not 
good enough". 

Now don't get me wrong, but even if you SHOULDN'T say/imply this idea 
to people it does not mean that it won't happen.  That is life, 
people are going to stab you in the back, lie to you, degrade you, 
and undermine your personal values and beliefs....We CANNOT  stop 
this but IMO we can counter act this by caring about others, and 
building people up, not cutting them down.  That is what is so great 
about the HP books, JKR make them honest, there ARE people like Snape 
and guess what- that isn't going to change because somebody complains 
about it....

Simon Wrote "IMO the English system is moving too much towards the 
standardised regurgitate all you know type of tests. How much someone 
knows is not all that is important, seeing how they can apply what 
they know to an entirely unknown situation needs to be examined more."
All I can say is- Hurrah Simon! I loathe standarised tests with a 
fiery passion that bubbles in the depths of my soul....

So to tie this horribly OT post back into HP, and maybe Simon, Neil 
(BTW, where has he been lately???) and our other UK members can help 
me out, is to ask can you see the parents of people (ie, Molly 
Weasley, Neville's Grandmother, or Hermione's Mum and Dad etc.) 
complaining about the behaviour of Snape? That is if they were aware 
of it. I understand that mostly it would not be a great issue, but I 
could see complaining about making Neville pickle toads(and after all 
he's been through!).

Scott

Who hopes he doesn't sound to terribly "American"