ETHICAL TENSION BETWEEN MORAL AND ACADEMIC EXCELLENCE IN CATHOLICS SCHOOL: A PRINCIPAL’S PERSPECTIVE

Abstract

Despite the progress of modern society in various fields of life, especially in education, people are yet to find true meaning, true happiness and real orientation towards ethical values. Most unfortunately, and on a daily basis, many young school leavers in Nigeria are far from real fulfillment and true happiness. They are either more confused themselves or confuse the entire system. Despite their well-paid jobs in public service, they still lack something tangibly meaningful. Alternatively, as the schools that produced them keep growing, glowing and blossoming in population/financial boom, the nation still suffers. Input determines output, and as a common elementary computer technology dictum goes, ‘garbage in, garbage out.’ This is our problem, and the root cause is not far-fetched. There is a discrepancy in the educational system due to lack of ethical ingredients in school management. It affects human behaviour, thoughts, actions. The in-thing is that because ethics is not given its proper place in schools, misplaced values take the center stage. Efforts to give ethics its proper place in educational institutions results in ethical tensions and dilemmas. This paper discusses the ethical predicaments that challenge most value-driven school managers in Nigerian Catholic/Mission school system which claims to be making a difference. Selecting the ethical issue of examination malpractice, we compared academic and moral excellence vis-à-vis ethics, its tensions, and the implications of its lack in Nigerian educational system. The rationale and root challenge are the corruption and injustice around the practice, and ethics alone paves the way forward.