However, besides the initial positive signs, there is also a fundamental issue that needs to be raised to orient from the beginning, which is to determine that the "happy school" model is not an emulation title with criteria to strive to complete.
With the model of a happy school, the ultimate measure and destination is to answer the question: Do students and teachers really feel happy in that school?
In fact, in education management for many years, we have witnessed many movements starting with very beautiful goals but then gradually turning into a race to complete targets. Then the number of titles increases, while substantive changes in schools take place insignificantly.
The model of a happy school should absolutely not follow those traces. Because happiness is not a title to be awarded, let alone a sign attached in front of the school gate, but it is a specific feeling of people who are studying and working in that school.
Don't let students study in a school that meets all the criteria of happiness but still feel pressure if they are afraid of being bullied every day in class, afraid of scores or not daring to express their thoughts.
And teachers also find it difficult to say they are happy if they still have to spend too much time on non-professional tasks, chịu áp lực thành tích (being under pressure for achievements) or always in a state of stress due to the burden of their profession.
It is still known that the concept of happiness is diverse. But in a school, happiness sometimes only comes from very simple things such as students being listened to when facing difficulties; teachers being trusted in their profession; parents accompanying the school instead of just putting pressure with scores, even moving hands and feet, threatening teachers.
How to make a student who used to be afraid of going to class but now eagerly goes to school every morning; a teacher who once intended to leave the profession but now still wants to stand on the podium. Or parents feel secure knowing that their children are studying in an environment that respects differences, knows how to protect children from school violence and knows how to nurture good values.
A happy school is only truly happy when it creates lasting changes that take place every day, in each lesson, in each relationship between teachers and students, between schools and families. Doing so, a happy school will become a natural state of education.
