To help curb the confused mess of parental ideals into which children are born, the government needs to start offering optional parenting classes, with tax write-offs or health insurance deductions as an incentive. The earlier parents take them the better; courses during pregnancy could qualify for a hospital bill deduction.

The incentive system for these classes could resemble those for driving courses. Every few years, I take a six-hour driving course to save a few hundred dollars on my driving insurance. Twenty others and I take a day to talk about car maintenance, as well as current road conditions and construction in the region. Admittedly, if the course didn’t come with an insurance incentive, I wouldn’t take it, because I’m not too concerned with the ways of anti-lock brakes.

But if I had children, I would be concerned about their well-being. Very concerned. And there isn’t a similar, easily accessible parenting course to take, a friendly place where an expert could talk about feeding and nutrition, local school district reputations and childcare program opportunities. As a society, we’re placing more bureaucratic emphasis on car maintenance than on child maintenance, and it’s coming back at us with a bite.

Arianne R. Cohen ’03, a Crimson editor, is a government concentrator in Leverett House.