Of poor performers and outstanding performers

08 Feb, 2019 - 00:02 0 Views

The ManicaPost

Morris Mtisi Education Correspondent
EXALTING outstanding performance in examination results and disparaging poor performance is normal.

That is what you do when your favourite football team is not performing.

It is the same right you claim to have or indeed have that we equally enjoy when we read examination results and speak. It is the same democracy and right we use when we analyse, criticise and appreciate announced examination results.

The way expert football analysts, including armchair critics, critique coaches, managers and players is exactly the same way education journalists or reporters worldwide appraise examination results.

It is exactly the same way football commentators critique the world’s most beautiful game; except that education is not football and it is not a game. So what more do you expect from Education commentators?

WHEN the 2018 examination results were announced a few weeks ago starting with the ‘A’ level results followed by ‘O’ level ones, this paper, as usual and as obliged, extended the announcement to the public through a summary analysis of the outcomes.

We were then inundated with angry complaints from a few school heads whose schools were mentioned by name for not doing their best. That is understood. No one wants to be mentioned for the wrong reasons. The same goes for your football teams. What do you want the Media to say when you as a school have hit below the belt in education . . . in an examination?

But let me labour to say something here to straighten the story of examination results and people’s democratic right to speak about them.

Ministry of Primary and Secondary Schools examinations managed and administered by ZIMSEC in Zimbabwe are not private examinations. That is why its examination results are announced publicly as soon as they are released.

Why are the results announced publicly?

Certainly not for the public to view and go mum!  Even in a hospital post-mortem, the pathologist does not open a dead body . . . see and shut up. He publishes what he deems to have caused the death. The public has the right to speak . . . to comment . . . to give remarks about examination results. That is the purpose of publicly announcing them after all. And the Media being the voice of the voiceless . . . responsible for educating, entertaining and informing the public, has the right to inform the public about them.

The Media cannot recognise outstanding performance and be quiet about flies in the ointment . . . poor performers. It is not only fair that the Media praises high performers for a job well done and expose culprits who do not perform as well as they ought to or even show no sign of effort towards reasonable achievement . . . some showing sheer complacency and an undesirable carefree attitude. It is an obligation.

Examination results, statistics, are not just figures. They are public facts and figures that clearly tell a story. When journalists (or even men and women in the streets) interpret those figures, a clear meaning comes out. While journalists can choose to write a news item, an education journo has the choice or liberty to read those results and intelligently conclude what they mean.

The schools that were mentioned in The Manica Post for example, as having performed poorly in spite of being well resourced must not grumble and lose temper. They must do either of the following two or both: Submit their own story . . . an interpretation of their own results or all of them generally. Every individual or organisation mentioned in the Media has the right of reply if they feel what a particular reporter published is wrong or not the whole truth. It is their right to supply the whole truth as they see it. Or swallow their pride and humbly take criticism . . . but certainly not fume and tell the world that the worst is their best.

Newspapers have no axes to grind with schools. This education reporter can assure you of this truth. We do this job responsibly even when sometimes the tide is against a school, its head, its students . . .whoever and whatever. And when that happens, there is nothing personal. Schools are public institutions and open to scrutiny and observation. We are aware that schools are one of the biggest consumers of our product. We get excited when schools do the best for the learners they teach. They are Zimbabwean. We are all Zimbabwean. When we do well, we do well together . . . and celebrate together. But when some school fails to deliver, we do not want to fail together…and commiserate together. We congratulate the school heads and the teachers for outstanding performance. That too is our obligation. But we cannot defend poor performance and smile when our team . . . even our A-Teams, lose and face relegation. Football lovers fume, some committing suicide, when their teams are relegated to the bottoms of the logs. Why? Because they want to win! Fans, supporters, love their teams so much that they cannot see them sink right under their noses. They cannot defend lousy performance.

In this environment of painful financial crises and economic woes in Zimbabwe, in which poor parents including rich ones struggle to afford an education for their children, even where government invests so much into education, no one wants to entertain excuses and anger. We want results . . . nothing else. Parents send their children to school to pass, not to fail. Simple. They do not put every dollar they have into the education of their children so that they fail…so that someone defends poor results and become angry when they are told not to waste their children’s time and school fees.

This article, please carefully note, is not in defence of careless, reckless or inaccurate reporting. Wherever and whenever a school or school head feels he or she has been short-changed, lied about or personally vilified, you have the right to reply or seek redress from the relevant offices . . . or even straight from the writer or reporter responsible.

Where necessary, circumstances always tell, appropriate apologies will be made and life goes on. An example is Chibuwe High School headmaster who did the right thing by approaching The Manica Post and like a gentleman presented his case, but also like a gentleman accepted the apologies I made on behalf of a reporter whom he felt had unfairly commented on the results of ‘his’ school.

The Hande High School mistress too did the right thing. Like a lady she beautifully complained and promised to put the record straight, namely that they are not well resourced as the paper claimed, but that they are in fact struggling to mobilise resources for better teaching and learning to take place. Again this reporter like a gentleman apologised for any inconveniencies caused. That is the way to go.

Of course, sometimes people do not say they are sorry because they are wrong or something is wrong. If one is hurt because another has done or said something pricking . . . often that is caused by viewing the same thing differently, that is enough to call for an apology. So whether one is saying sorry because he or she is wrong or because they realise the other is aching for thinking differently, it is always good ‘kuwanza sori’ . . . to apologise . . . and people move on. We are tired of people drawing daggers against each other, throwing tantrums around and being on each other’s throat, are you not? Educationists must be the last people to fight because they do not agree with another person’s opinions or views about anything . . . anything at all. Educated people are open-minded.

They listen and respect another point of view even if it may be different from his or hers. People who agree on every single opinion and point of view are not genuine thinkers.

At best we must all strive to be happy as we each do what we are supposed to do to develop this beautiful country for the country, for our families and indeed for ourselves as individuals.

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