“The frame of the metal detector worked exactly the same as last time. Most of the children entered without problems,” said the head of the press service of the mayor’s office, Nikita Chebotarev (he was on duty, RG note). In some the doorbell rang, they took out forgotten phones, vaporizers, calculators, keys and coins from their pockets. The boys tried to take off their belts, one girl unbuttoned the top button of her blouse and took out a huge metal pendant.
The guards on duty were frightened by these movements. “You don’t need to take anything off!” – the “organizer outside the classroom” waved his hands, and “in the world” – the professor of human security Dmitry Sklyar.
The scandal with the half-naked graduates greatly affected Voronezh teachers, and then officials, after the prosecutor’s office, the Investigative Committee and the State Duma became involved in the analysis of the incident.
But he taught me something. For example, how crazy an information storm can go: yesterday on Telegram channels it was reported that high school students were being groped by foreigners at the school entrance. Because it is very easy to generate publicity, but almost impossible to amortize it. After the posts, the school began receiving anonymous threats.
But let the sociologists and law enforcement officers deal with this; My heart aches for the children. Without realizing it, I looked at the situation through his eyes, and this image now haunts me, the father of two schoolgirls. The children came to take the exam: main, state, final! They told them a lot about how important he was and how their future depended on him. Both teachers and parents spoke. The children prepared, wrote exams and studied with tutors. We came to deliver and then – bam! They are not allowed to enter. It is not clear why: the frame rings. They take everything out of their pockets, take off their earrings and chains, but the frame continues to ring.
Yes, 130 out of 143 graduates entered school without problems. Of the remaining 13, most emptied their pockets of coins, phones, smoking accessories and also passed. There are a few unlucky ones left, maybe only two girls, whose backs and hairstyles have already been shown on all television channels. Let’s not talk about what and how they had to film, although this is also torture and humiliation. Think about something else: they came to take an exam. And they can’t do it. It’s not because they don’t know, they can’t get to the place where they take the Unified State Exam. And they don’t know why. Psychologists call this state frustration; can drive even an adult with a stable psyche crazy, let alone a frightened teenager.
When asked why children are subjected to a metal detector that reacts not only to the phone, but also to the slightest metal (a paper crib sheet, by the way, the frame is not noticeable), all government representatives, from school to Voronezh region – confidently answered: “This is prescribed by the standards for passing the Unified State Exam.”
If so, then the current procedure contributes little to successfully passing the Unified State Exam, and the wonderful farewell school years give the child’s psyche such a boost that it will come back to haunt him more than once.
There is a road sign that says “Caution, children!” They also place it under glass on buses when they take schoolchildren on field trips or to summer camps. This sign instructs those around them to be more attentive and careful, to let people pass and not to be reckless. Let’s hang this poster in schools, during the Unified State Exam, when our children undergo the first serious test of their lives. They are the future of our country, we raise them carefully and in most cases we protect them from adversity. Let’s help them here too. Or at least let’s not interfere.
P.S.
To be fair, I interviewed several other high school students who were taking the Unified State Exam in other schools on the same day. Everyone arrived at the exam venue without any problem. Some wear earrings and chains. Maybe it’s a question of the settings of a particular metal detector?
Tomorrow at school number 62 there is a second mathematics exam. The admission procedure is the same for the entire country and will not change, the Voronezh mayor’s office said.
