Ethics – Morality – School

Jiří Mareš, Zdeněk Beneš
2020 Pedagogika (Praha)  
In 2019, we celebrated thirty years since the Velvet Revolution. We celebrated the desired change in the political regime and the transition to democracy, including the change in economic and social conditions; in short, the restoration of freedom. Th e celebrations were mainly about successes, the raising of people's standard of living, etc. Speakers returned to the past in black-and-white speeches. It was as if they had forgotten Jan Werich's observation that "Every era has a gown and that
more » ... n has a train. When the era passes, the gown is gone, but the train is still passing" (Janoušek, 1994, pp. 12-13). In other words: after the change in the political system, we continue to pull the burden of the past behind us and, in many cases, add to the problems and troubles that produce and permit the present era. It is no coincidence that the Czech education system has boasted of its quantitative indicators (e.g. increasing the number of secondary schools, increasing the number of public and private schools, massifying secondary and higher education, and increasing teachers' salaries). Th e problems related to the continuous reforms of the school system, repeated eff orts to reduce the demands on the training of prospective teachers, a decline in the quality of teaching and teaching in many primary and secondary schools, and, in many fi elds, a decline in the quality of graduates, were somewhat left behind. However, what was not mentioned during the celebrations was the ethical and moral aspects of the functioning of Czech schools and the open, unresolved problems that relate to these. Th ey start with dealing seriously with the past in education (see e.g.
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