MALAYSIA - I WOULD like to highlight the punishment imposed on students by my child's school in Bandar Utama, Selangor.

Pupils are made to stay back for 10 to 15 minutes at the end of the school day as punishment for being noisy.

I feel that there are better ways to punish pupils than making them stay back.

Teachers must realise that this punishment is not effective.

Instead, parents, bus drivers, transport providers, residents around the school and the general public who need to access the area are adversely affected.

Once there is a delay in the dismissal of school, traffic along the road will become congested and this will cause inconvenience to road users.

The scenario is even more nightmarish on a Friday when the Muslims start to arrive at the surau for prayers.

Recently, I went to fetch my son after extra classes held for Year Six pupils in the school.

The class was supposed to be dismissed at 3.30pm and a thunderstorm was brewing.

However, the teacher decid-ed to hold back the children until 3.40pm.

As a result, many pupils were caught in the rain.

Although the teacher might have meant well, I just feel that the punishment she chose was wrong as it would have no positive effect on the pupils' behaviour.

CONCERNED PARENT

Via e-mail

This article was first published in The Star on May 11, 2008.