Do some students need a firmer hand than others?

The New York Times published a video (see below) that showed a teacher at a charter school in 2014 reprimanding a student for answering a math question incorrectly. The teacher, speaking sternly, rips the student’s paper in front of the other students. Some might say, “That’s awful.” “You’re hurting the child’s feelings.” “That’s embarrassing and abusive.” Or the old standby: “That’s racist!”

Notice how the other students react after the teacher calls on someone else to give the correct answer. Rather than shrinking back in fear, several students raise their hands, seemingly eager to reveal the correct answer. What’s depicted in the video is supposedly a style of strict-discipline teaching called “no excuses.”

Subcultural factors and home life play roles in academic underachievement. If students don’t receive behavioral and educational discipline at home, where will they get it if not in school (and church, if they attend)? If you’ve ever been in certain classrooms or seen them in videos, you know how chaotic they can be. The no-excuses teaching method is also about behavior, not just academic achievement. Some children do need a firmer hand than others.

Teachers can’t seem to win. They get the bulk of the blame for the academic achievement gap between the races, and when they try to narrow the gap, people criticize their efforts. Chalkbeat New York addressed arguments for and against the no-excuses style of teaching. One of the cons is that the extra learning doesn’t justify the cost. One student admits to learning more but she was stressed out. Another con claim is that no-excuses “perpetuates racist forms of control”—mostly white teachers telling mostly black kids what to do, and schools “targeted elements of [black] culture … as misbehaviors.”

The pro side argues that the radical structure of no-excuses is radically anti-racist: “Looking at test scores, all the highest academic results ever produced for poor students and students of color have come from no-excuses schools. … No schools, no-excuses or otherwise, have successfully educated large numbers of low-income students of color at the levels they desire, but no-excuses schools have come closest.”

What about the parents’ responsibility to raise children to behave in school? Sadly, some don’t care. Parents who call themselves Christians have a duty to care. “Correct your son, and he will give you rest; Yes, he will give delight to your soul” (Proverbs 29:17); and “The rod and rebuke give wisdom, but a child left to himself brings shame to his mother” (Proverbs 29:15).

Although children will learn many things from many people besides their parents, Mom and Dad are the first educators and must instill correct behavior. That’s why family stability is important. A child is better off living with his married, biological parents. Too many are born out of wedlock, however, and grow up with no father living in the home to love, protect, and teach them. Regardless, every individual is accountable under man-made law and before God.