School violence

Mar 16, 2023 Editorial

Kaieteur News – Now it is at Fort Wellington, and Mr. Marlon Daniels makes it 12 teachers on the receiving end of violence. This is a dozen too many, and must come to a hard stop right now.  Our teachers are being attacked and assaulted in their places of work, in that sacred, inviolable space, their classrooms where they enlighten and guide our young minds, the future instructors and workers of Guyana.  When parents get hostile and aggressive, and cross lines never crossed in times before, they must be taught a sharp lesson that they will not forget. An example has to be made of them, starting immediately.

Long ago, there are few, if any, records of parents ending up in classrooms and beating up teachers.  It just was not done, not even thought of by parents before.  Those with complaints of wrongdoing by teachers never found themselves anywhere near a classroom.  Their place, their approach with hat in hand, was in the office of the head teacher.  There they laid out their case, were usually given a fair hearing, and accepted whatever was offered by those in charge of a school.

It could be said with accuracy that children lived in dread of their parents being summoned, or turning up unannounced, at their institution of learning.  Few were the children, and fewer were the parents, who took it upon themselves to protest against the disciplinary actions of those controlling classrooms, the teachers.  It could be said that humanity being what it is, that some children were taken advantage of, may have been the victims of spite or too rough treatment.  But the reality was that children did not go home and complain to their parents.  For, considering the temperature of the times, they could be in for a few more blows to drum some sense into their heads, whether they were right or wrong.  It may have been unfair and improper, but this was the nature of those times, and it worked well for the longest while.

In sharp contrast, today we live with this spectacle, these horror stories, of parents invading school premises, bypassing the head teacher’s office, and heading straight for the classroom of the reported at fault teacher, and administering their own style of law, discipline, and justice.  There are no circumstances under which such actions can be condoned.  Not the recent incident that took place in the Graham’s Hall Primary School compound where a male teacher was beaten. Nor the one that happened even more recently at St. Angela’s Primary in the capital city, where a female parent pummeled a female teacher. As the media reported, a security guard and other teachers, who all intervened to deescalate the situation suffered injuries.  Nor this newest episode in Fort Wellington.

This is highly unacceptable and cannot continue.  Our schools are neither rum shops nor the market square.  Like places of worship, schools should be off-limits for these kinds of violent behaviours. Teachers have already made clear where they stand by coming out in solidarity with their injured and humiliated colleagues.  For its part, the Ministry of Education must manifest zero tolerance, with no exceptions, for this type of misconduct, these instances of brawling and vulgarity by parents, who have thrown all caution to the winds, by taking matters into their hands, regardless of stern warnings from the Ministry of Education.

It is our position that there must be consequences for these invasions and abuses by parents.  Parents have other constructive mechanisms to address their concerns.  They must fully utilize those in their efforts to get to the bottom of what negatively impacted their child.  We believe that the police should be called in, charges should be laid in these circumstances; disorderly parents face the court, and if found guilty, then the penalty should be a stiff fine, plus community work, and a lengthy probation period, during which time school premises are totally off-limits.  The pictures of these parents should be published in the media, which we believe will serve as a deterrent to any repetition, and a warning to other parents contemplating abuse and violence to our educators.  This nonsense must stop.  If it does not, then there is jailing.

• Editorial, Fort Wellington, Mr. Marlon Daniels, School, violence