School Stuff

I was thinking of getting into education politics again by creating a category, ‘School’ and posting anti-school articles. A pity I didn’t really have the time to maintain such a log about the progress of democractisation in our school. Nevertheless, I shall let the head of the cat out of the bag for a little basking in the sun.

It is yet another SBC today and it is interesting to note how the absence of teachers can trigger extremely stimulating responses from the audience. The students are finally willing to talk. Like what some other SU member said in Mandarin, “Secondary 4 students are hard to handle.” I think so too. Of course, this time, there are much changes to the SU organisation and they way the spend money.

The most glaring part of the whole SBC is definitely the presentation by the finance controller. Firstly, I would like to point out that we did not vote for a cute, young boy to be the finance controller; we thought he’d better off being a Welfare Secretary. Secondly, the proposed budget is a crazy $10 050. I am not sure about the $50 that seems so extra that I thought our dear Fat Brother should have donated it out of his pocket. Overall, it is just, too big a figure to swallow. But perspective does help, each student contributes only $5 – enjoying nothing at all. The rich guys out there can treat it as money for feeding some dogs or donated to some organisation for the disabled, but not for people like us. We cannot afford to pay such a huge sum of money, only for it to be wasted. Yes, Master Rasputin, the money that is removed quietly, and without our consent from the CDS is like a form of investment. It is like a one of the bets we are laying down in the great HCI Casino that is going through some ‘Integrated Programme’, to integrate all forms of entertainment with education – without forgetting to forget about Confucian’s teachings (or any other Chinese moral teachings) and go gamble. Investment for the better good of the whole school. Yeah, right. Oh, and according to a ex-member of the SU functioning body, the projected amount is usually only 75% of the actually amount they are going to spent. This time, the pocketting of our money ‘for the sake of greater good’ is a result of the school being stingy with their money because they want to pound the soil beside the canteen, and insert some piles there. That reminds us of the announcement last year that the building of the SALT centre and the science building would commence in October/November 2004. It appears otherwise. The whole place is rounded up but I don’t see work going on. Good job guys!

Of course, there is a welfare initiative to stuff the mouths of dissidents about this sum of money that we all have to fork out. And it is the conversion of a shabby, tiny corner of the canteen into a Meeting Room, which the students are allowed to use for their meetings, or study sessions. The irony is that the room is said to be wired with wireless LAN for surfing the net. Anyone with a sense would know the room is going to be our LAN gaming centre soon. Nevertheless, we must trust our students. The dissidents are probably the only ones who are going to use the room properly – to discuss about revolution plans. Of course, they probably would decide that it is impossible to overthrow the damn regime halfway through the meeting and start taking out their laptops from their bags…

That dumb thing aside, the SBC included a touching speech about the school culture and how our school environment contrast with other schools’. Admit it, this school is not ready. A culture is something built over the years and if the traditional and most important culture about teamwork and all the nonsense are already questioned, I wonder why we are talking about having a new vibrant culture that embraces any possible trace of diversity we have among our students. Sometimes, we just don’t have the right person at the right position to do the right thing that will benefit the right group of people. Such alignment is almost an impossibility in the history of man. It is as though the planets of our solar system, they hardly align, but once they do, they would create something supposedly power. Even so, it takes millions of centuries to occur.

The boy guarding the beanstalk now have to hold this pillar to the giant’s castle carefully and prevent it from collapsing. The beanstalk is now more and more fragile with the internal conflicts within the giant’s castle. Now that the giant is dead, Rasputin and his gang is plotting about how they can collect as much of the giant’s wealth as possible and keep it for themselves. Everywhere, there are dissidents waiting to chop down this beanstalk, especially when this boy is not alert. Personally, I regret not climbing up the beanstalk and searching for some gold coins for myself after the giant’s death. Now I am waiting, for this beanstalk to collapse with all the castle’s wealth falling down for all to share. That will be the most glorious day of our revolution.