For many of us, the best part of a meal is the dessert; in fact, a meal of just dessert would be a dream! Just lay on the dessert, please! Let us go further, though – bring on many desserts, the more the merrier!
Let us be having the trifle, the ice cream, the malva pudding with lashings of custard, the crème brulee, the crème caramel, the strawberry mousse, cheesecake, crumble, banoffee pie, pannacotta, pavlova.
Shall we go on? The thought of any one of them, let alone all of them, might make us salivate wildly.
In the minds of some people, desserts are a bonus at the end of a meal, a reward. Many meals will not include a dessert, so consequently they are seen as a reward, a treat, something special we have earned or deserved. In such a way, our juicy desserts have become our just deserts.
We are all into deserts, into getting what we believe we rightfully deserve. Indeed, schools are all into deserts, into pupils receiving what it is deemed they deserve, be it Colours or prizes for things that they have done well or punishments for those things that they have done wrong. For many people, education is seen as being about results, about what is deserved, about status, money, power, positions, all those things which are gained because of what is deserved.
If a child does well, she receives a merit; if a child does badly, he receives a demerit. Simple, is it not? In both cases, it is what is warranted or earned or deserved. So then a merit is the opposite of a demerit.
If that is the case, what is the opposite of ‘deserve’?
Surely it would be ‘serve’? Yet, here is the problem: we do a disservice to service by emphasising what children deserve as opposed to who or how they serve. There is rather a disconnect between deserving and serving. We want the deserving but not the serving. Serving should be the plus and deserving the negative.
