Why not to be a Monitor

In my 11 yo daughter’s new class, they decided to appoint the monitors. There seemed to be a monitor for everything – from class monitor to vice-monitor to books monitor to uniform monitor to cubby (cupboard) monitor… by the end of it, half the class was a monitor of something or the other. It reminded me of how designations are created in the corporate world.

 

My daughter was in the other half, the half that weren’t monitors of anything. Really, I needled her, you couldn’t become a monitor even with so many openings? I didn’t want to be one, she said. Yeah, right, I said, a case of sour grapes. No, really, she said.

 

I expected her to give the Spiderman line – “With great power comes great responsibility” and the point that she didn’t want any responsibility. But no, her argument was different. The teachers will keep making the monitors do one thing or the other. Worse, based on her knowledge of the other branch of the school she was coming from, the teachers will often ask one of the monitors to carry the books or carry out some other “errands” at the end of the class. And when the kid returned to class after that, the new teacher would punish him or her for coming late! Yeah, that sounds about right - life’s like that.

 

As if all this wasn’t bad enough, one time a kid said, “I am a class monitor”, the teacher snapped back, “So what? I am a class teacher”. A monitor may supersede the lower lifeforms in the classroom, but a teacher is still the boss. Maybe my daughter does have a point after all.

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