OPINION> Commentary
Ethical code for teachers
(China Daily)
Updated: 2008-07-01 07:56

We should lay down a clear law to demand teachers protect the safety of students during disasters, says an article in Beijing News. The following is an excerpt:

The Ministry of Education released the revised edition of the moral regulations for primary and secondary school teachers on its official website, soliciting public advice. This draft, for the first time, clarified that it is part of the professional ethics of teachers to protect the safety of students and all teachers should abide by it. Eleven years have passed since the last revision of these moral regulations in 1997. The society has an ever-increasing demand for the revision of these regulations under new situations.

Any law or regulation should advance with times, so should the moral regulations for teachers. The adding of the regulation that teachers should protect the safety of students easily reminds people of the recent, much talked-about incident of Runner Fan, which is a nickname ironically given by netizens to the irresponsible teacher surnamed Fan who ran away from the classroom unmindful of his students during the May 12 earthquake. His running away triggered a public concern about the responsibility and rights of a teacher, the morality of a teacher and the social values, offering insights for the building of morality and the rule of law. It is no wonder that Fan's running away prompted the revision of teachers' moral regulations.

In Japan, a quake-intensive region, it is ruled that when a quake takes places, teachers cannot abandon their students. If a teacher like Fan is found out in Japan, he would be sacked immediately and can never gain a foothold in the society. But the rule relating to this duty of teachers to protect students' safety is obscure in China's laws and regulations. It gives Fan excuses for shirking his responsibilities, and even helps Fan win the sympathy of others.

It is important for us to have laws to prevent such impudent behaviors from being repeated. The law is the basis of morality while morality is a thing that transcends the requirements of a law.

When the quake struck Sichuan, a good many teachers put the safety of students at the forefront, which shows that among the teachers, sublime feelings are not uncommon.

We should mark out the threshold of morality for teachers to avoid the next Runner Fan tarnishing the overall moral image of teachers again.

(China Daily 07/01/2008 page8)