Many of our classroom teachers at both the elementary and secondary levels are said to be throwing up their arms in despair, getting grey hairs or losing their hair relatively early in life because of the intense pressure to which they are subjected in today's classrooms.
We commiserate with them even as we urge them not to despair for, after all, they are professionally and duty bound to rise to the challenges and be major role models and sources of inspiration and transformation for their young charges.
We are convinced that generally, notwithstanding the many distractions and the magnitude, scope and complexity of the problems they must confront in the classroom daily, our teachers are equal to the task at hand if given the necessary support and the appropriate resources with which to work.
However, we also know that the work of our classroom teachers would be enhanced considerably should their efforts be buttressed by effective parenting at home, for we are equally convinced that in today's turbulent and uncompromising world, more than ever before, enlightened and effective parenting is the fulcrum upon which the nature and success of our societies pivot.
It is against this backdrop that we congratulate the Department for Education Research Policy and Innovations (DERPI) for its persistence in organising parenting workshops with the support of the government and Dutch development funds being made available through funding agency USONA.
But even as we congratulate DERPI, we wish to encourage the DERPI team to redouble its efforts and find more creative ways to persuade more parents to participate in the active parenting workshops. We have no issue with the adage "it takes a village to raise a child," but we fervently believe that the most effective persons in the village raising our children must be our army of enlightened parents –fathers as well as mothers.