As an introduction, it is necessary to specify the work of the faculty, which is established in the Basic Curriculum of Education at the beginning of each course. It also details the general vision of the curriculum and the general output profile that students should have after the completion of compulsory education. For example, in the transversal competence to learn how to learn and think, it is sought to develop critical thinking in students, for which the students must learn to interpret and evaluate the information by themselves. In a similar direction, in the transversal competence to learn to be oneself, it seeks to take decisions autonomously and assume responsibility for one's own decisions and obligations.
With this in mind, it can be said that with the restrictive and unintelligible measures that have been taken so far, this objective has not been strengthened. There is no doubt that thanks to these measures implemented by the Basque Government the type of students who learn to obey authority and learn to control their attitude thanks to external agents and who, at the same time, motivate themselves is strengthened. If the figure of authority is lacking, such students will not have confidence in themselves to make decisions and act effectively and will not be able to control their attitude. He will be a student who will have difficulty seeing connections between positions and conclusions. A student dependent on the professor or teacher and connected with incompetence. Students with difficulties in understanding and expressing their own needs. Student who aims to avoid the sanction. Is that how we want to educate our students or our children? Do we in the school community agree theoretically and in practice with what kind of students you want to achieve? And what kind of society would be built in the future with this kind of student body?
I see a parallel between the pompous electoral words (well-being, sustainable development, equality, auzolan, personal goal…) and what we are required of teachers in the curriculum. On the one hand, what we all want to read or listen to in different documents (knowing that paper supports everything) is disseminated and then the opposite is done without any kind of control or payment. The important thing is to fake and know how to sell. We live in an uninterrupted media campaign.
No doubt, in today's society, blind or robotic obedience is not needed to develop as a person. People with the ability to think and be critical are needed, also in the world of work.
In fact, how have children and young people been treated with the measures taken in the face of the Covid-19 pandemic? Have they been treated with dignity or as malefactors? Have the needs of children and young people been taken into account when establishing such a harsh confinement? Has leisure time for young people and adults been regulated equally? The main objective has been obedience to authority and the absorption of established norms. In addition, the main function of the school has been to provide care, so that parents can carry out their work. The authorities have put the comfort or ease of managing the situation ahead of the development of children and young people.
The authorities are reproaching us to the public about the increase in the level of contagion in summer and accusing us of “irresponsibility” and applying the toughest measures in Europe, although at the level of contagion, compared to countries that do not consider them as hard, worse results are obtained. It is disturbing to know that at the beginning of the new course the Department of Education will behave similarly.
Similar pedagogy is used in schools, for example. There are professors who tend to haggle and impose excessively strict measures when the situation cannot escape from their hands and control the “anti-pedagogical sermon” throughout the class, despite the problems posed by a few students. It is the pedagogy of sorrows and threats, the worst way to achieve self-employed and critical people with conscience.
Thus, students are taught not to question authority and not to resist, to be blind obedience. And we, as educators, want to get a responsible student. Students willing to question and, where appropriate, deal with the facts and measures taken. Anyone who believes that he is going to act effectively in the face of a lack of authority, capable of acting. It feels useful even if it is rejected by others. A student with a system of internal values and who knows how to take into account the values and needs of others. A student with the ability to think. The student is able to understand and express his/her own needs without harming others. Person who knows how to commit and know how to collaborate.
Therefore, if teachers have to be an example at the level of self-esteem, we must be the first to be responsible and critical. Let us start before September, otherwise the ability to remain silent and unmoved will prevail in classes.