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Committed Parents: First, it confirmed the shift towards that consumerism which was becoming so marked a feature of the system: schools were now obliged to listen to and, to some extent, were fashioned by their more vocal and committed parents. While this may have been in many ways a good thing, what was less desirable was that this process gave undue influence to schools in middle-class areas where there was little difficulty in recruiting parents who were often well connected within the local professions and who knew how to lobby effectively and how best to organise.
The first letter to parents is likely to be an invitation to a meeting that will start the scheme, since most schools choose to begin in this way. A big meeting like this gives everyone a sense of launching the PACT scheme properly, and not just slipping into it. It suggests an effort by the whole school, saying to parents: 'We're committed: what about you?' Make sure the school is well prepared for such a meeting. You need to have discussed the ideas behind the scheme thoroughly, for at least two good reasons.
Early missionaries to the American Indians, for example, reported that opportunities to confess sins, to carry out penances, and thus to escape from supernatural punishment, were welcomed with eagerness. Ancient Egyptians believed that after death their spirits would appear before a tribunal and that sins committed during life would then be appropriately compensated by punishments. Even during a person's lifetime, the gods were thought to be alert to bring ruin, or even death, if he committed offenses.
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