Controversy

Not too long ago, a controversy was created when a Hwa Chong student decided to air his grievances on the internet. The article can be found here:http://singaporeseen.stomp.com.sg/stomp/sgseen/what_bugs_me/418626/teacher_takes_students_belongings_to_teach_them_a_lesson.html

In short, the student was unhappy about the way a teacher handled the situation where his classroom door was left unlocked and empty, which provided a chance for thieves to make a tidy profit. As a result, the teacher decided to teach the guilty students a lesson by removing unattended laptops and other belongings.

In my opinion, it is wrong for someone to take your belongings without permission, which is what the teacher did. However, if we looked at things from his viewpoint, he probably thought it was a harmless way to teach the students a lesson about protecting their belongings, and surely would not have expected such a strong reaction from one of the students.

I have experienced a similar incident before. At the start of the year, our class returned from flag-raising to find 4 laptops missing from our class. Later in the day, we were informed that the laptops were taken so as to teach us a lesson for leaving our classroom door open when we left for flag-raising. Although mine wasn't taken, I could empathize with those who had theirs' taken. It would surely be a traumatic experience for one to find that his beloved and expensive laptop was gone. They would dread telling their parents about it, as they were the ones who had forked out their hard-earned money to pay for the laptop. then, if the parents were willing, they would have to spend more money on another laptop.

I feel that instead of taking the belongings of the students, the teacher could have given them a warning, and introduced a punishment for future offenders. This would have caused far less controversy, and would not have resulted in a student posting his outburst on a public forum.