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recently, the central committee of the communist party of china and the state council issued the "opinions on promoting the spirit of educators and strengthening the construction of high-quality and professional teaching team in the new era", which emphasized "maintaining the right to educational punishment and supporting teachers to actively discipline", which aroused great concern in society.

in recent years, due to excessive attention and care from parents, teachers often "rebound" from some parents in their daily teaching management, especially when criticizing and educating students. under the unreasonable and excessive complaints and visits from some parents, some schools and relevant departments, in order to calm things down, have criticized and even held teachers accountable without principles, resulting in teachers being punished at the least and losing their jobs at the worst. some teachers have had to give up their daily discipline of students.

a few years ago, an excellent class teacher at the municipal level in a primary school in a southwestern city was punished due to complaints from a parent. this parent complained about the departure of three class teachers in two years, and even the teacher's failure to praise her child was a complaint. under the chilling effect, in recent years, "buddhist" teachers have become common in primary and secondary schools, and many teachers have adopted the attitude of "less trouble is worse than more trouble", which has caused dissatisfaction among many parents and teachers.

without rules, there will be no order. punishment is a necessary means of education, and the discipline of students is also a basic responsibility of school education. as early as 2020, in order to solve the phenomenon of "buddhist" teachers, the ministry of education issued order no. 49 "rules for educational punishment in primary and secondary schools (trial)", which legally gave teachers the right to discipline students, including punishment. unfortunately, due to various reasons, the implementation of the right to punish is not ideal, and the phenomenon of "buddhist" teachers has increased. to truly and thoroughly solve this problem, we need to start from three aspects.

first of all, schools and relevant departments should dare to say no to unreasonable complaints. with the progress of society and the development of new media platforms, students and parents have mastered the channels for complaints, and they often complain and report, post them online, and form public opinion. a grassroots middle school principal said that an important task every week is to deal with various reports and complaints.

in the face of unreasonable visits from some parents, both schools and education authorities must adhere to principles and deal with so-called public opinion based on facts and in accordance with laws and regulations. they cannot simply give in, let alone simply hold teachers accountable. irrational parents are a minority, but if relevant departments repeatedly compromise, it will encourage more unreasonable or excessive reports. on this issue, not only education authorities must have determination, but also grassroots governments and judicial departments. only in this way can education departments and schools firmly safeguard teachers' legal right to punish and actively discipline students.

secondly, parents should also establish a correct view of education. human growth is a process of socialization under constant constraints. punishment is a necessary means to educate children and help them grow. most of the best primary and secondary schools in the west are private schools, which often have strict school rules and punishments. eton college once explained its strict school rules by saying: a child who has never been trained to follow rules in life will not be able to control his own behavior habits out of thin air. this is completely consistent with some of our traditional educational concepts.

unfortunately, in recent years, due to the misleading of some misunderstandings of advanced western educational concepts and the overprotection of parents, some parents have no principles to respect their children's personality, no basic rules, and are very averse to normal discipline, including punishment. this is an important reason for many excessive complaints. we need to correct parents' educational concepts and create a harmonious soft environment for teachers' discipline. parents should also think from the perspective of others and be tolerant of teachers' flaws in the process of discipline, especially the flaws in the process of punishment, so that more teachers can dare to discipline.

furthermore, relevant laws and regulations should be further improved to reassure teachers. although the "rules for educational punishment in primary and secondary schools (trial)" grant teachers the right to discipline and punish students, it also stipulates prohibitive requirements. these requirements still have idealized descriptions and ambiguity, such as "standing in the corner for a period exceeding the normal limit" and "punishment due to personal emotions, likes and dislikes". under the complaints and visits of parents and students, it is easy to fall into a trap similar to "excessive self-defense", turning normal punishment into punishment and equating punishment with corporal punishment.

schools should not be too harsh on teachers in terms of relevant management regulations, such as "there are no students who cannot be taught, only teachers who cannot teach". there are more than 16 million primary and secondary school teachers in china, and most of them are just ordinary people. we should not use overly strict standards to require these ordinary teachers.

in short, only by firmly safeguarding teachers' right to punish and tolerating teachers' flaws in disciplining students can teachers boldly discipline children instead of worrying about being held accountable and giving up their disciplinary responsibilities.

(the author is the editor-in-chief of china education online and an academic member of the china education development strategy society)