Teachers face violent attacks — by pupils

Gauteng, Limpopo stats reveal serious misbehaviour

● Attempted murder, stabbing, assault, intimidation, theft, drug-dealing, sexual violence . . . It sounds like the charge sheet at any magistrate’s court. In fact, it is a list of offences that have led to disciplinary action against hundreds of schoolchildren in the past year.

Limpopo education officials alone have handled 942 cases of serious pupil misconduct in the past 12 months. Since January last year Gauteng schools have expelled 151 children, 35 of them for assaulting teachers and other school staff.

One Pretoria high school teacher told the Sunday Times that she was considering a new career after a pupil punched her around the head and face.

Teachers’ union Naptosa said members often felt humiliated when perpetrators of misconduct were treated as heroes by their peers when they returned to class after suspension.

Mpumalanga education department spokesman Jasper Zwane said parental apathy frequently undermined schools’ attempts to deal with troublemakers.

“Some of the parents do not pitch when they are invited to observe the disciplinary processes . . . making it difficult for schools to instil corrective measures.”

A learner confessed to baking ‘space cookies’ in the early hours of the morning when his parents were asleep. He sold them for R10 each

Margareth Phalane Headmistress of Hillview High School in Pretoria since last month

● A traumatised teacher at Hillview High School in Pretoria is considering changing jobs after she was attacked by a Grade 10 girl in the presence of the girl’s mother and the acting principal.

She is among three female teachers who have been assaulted by female pupils at different schools countrywide since February.

The teacher confirmed that she had opened a charge of assault against the pupil at the Mayville police station in the city.

She said she was seated in the principal’s office when the “out of control” pupil began punching her on her head and face.

“I was totally dumbfounded. I had never felt so unsafe in the workplace before. It left me quite unsettled and I’m considering other career options.”

A staggering 1 473 pupils in Gauteng and Limpopo have been involved in serious misconduct, including using and dealing in drugs, bullying fellow pupils, assaulting teachers and pupils, theft and carrying dangerous weapons.

Figures supplied to the Sunday Times reveal that the Limpopo education department handled 942 cases from April last year to March while the Gauteng education department recorded 531 incidents since January last year.

According to Limpopo’s statistics, 358 pupils were involved in physical abuse, including assaulting other pupils, and 234 verbally abused fellow pupils. Another 106 pupils were caught abusing drugs and alcohol.

Gauteng education department spokesman Steve Mabona confirmed that 151 pupils were expelled from their schools for dealing in drugs, bullying, assaulting teachers and pupils and attempted murder.

Alarmingly, 31 pupils were involved in assaulting teachers and other school staff members last year, and a further four this year.

“When you expel a learner, he must within a certain period be introduced into another school. He’s still a child who is at a schoolgoing age so, constitutionally, the [law] does not allow for the child to be permanently removed from school.”

Mabona said that 143 pupils, who were found to have abused drugs, were slapped with a one-year suspended sentence and ordered to attend a drug rehabilitation programme.

Dealers in drugs

Mabona said pupil drug dealers at high schools who were two to three years above the average age of pupils in their class were banned from returning to school and were instead asked to attend adult education and training centres.

The Gauteng office of the National Institute for Crime Prevention and the Reintegration of Offenders confirmed that school governing bodies in the province had referred 320 pupils to the organisation for assistance since January.

Alida Boshoff, Nicro’s area manager for Gauteng, said: “We need to do much more in terms of crime prevention and going to schools to talk about how to address violence at schools.

“About 50% of referrals are learners having experienced drugs or busy experimenting with it.”

The North West education department said that it had “a minor record” of pupil misconduct cases because schools were not reporting cases.

It confirmed, however, that two pupils who assaulted teachers last month were suspended for seven days.

Pupils expelled in other provinces since April include:

Northern Cape: two pupils who tested ● positive for using illegal substances;

Mpumalanga: 18 pupils found guilty of ● fighting at school, carrying dangerous weapons, assaulting teachers, assaulting a principal in the presence of parents, and hurling insults at teachers; and

Western Cape: 126 pupils were expelled ● last year.

Geoffrey van der Merwe, spokesman for the Northern Cape education department, said there were a further five pending cases for expulsion which included a case in which teachers had been threatened.

He said that a female pupil at Bothithong High in Kuruman who assaulted a woman teacher last month was issued a written warning and ordered to attend an anger management programme.

Mpumalanga education department spokesman Jasper Zwane said the parents of some of the expelled pupils said they were “tired of the learners’ behaviour”.

He added: “Some of the parents do not pitch when they are invited to observe the disciplinary processes . . . making it difficult for schools to instil corrective measures.”

Jessica Shelver, spokeswoman for Western Cape education MEC Debbie Schaefer, said pupils with behavioural problems underwent a two-week intensive behaviour support programme run by the Ottery Youth Care Centre.

Fourteen pupils were suspended from classes at Hillview High last month for a range of offences, including selling muffins laced with dagga to other pupils.

The Gauteng branch of the National Professional Teachers Organisation of South Africa said it had received numerous reports this year of pupils throwing chairs at teachers and swearing and spitting at them.

“The feedback Naptosa gets from its members is that a learner who returns to class after suspension is often regarded by some fellow learners as a hero while the educator continues to feel humiliated.”