TTUTA: Arrests, suspensions won’t solve school violence

The Trinidad and To­ba­go Uni­fied Teach­ers’ As­so­ci­a­tion (TTUTA) says vi­o­lence has no place in schools, but warned that sus­pen­sions, ex­pul­sions and po­lice in­ter­ven­tion alone will not solve the prob­lem.

TTUTA said de­ci­sive in­ter­ven­tion is nec­es­sary where stu­dents pose a threat to teach­ers or oth­er stu­dents and ac­knowl­edged that sus­pen­sions and ex­pul­sions are le­git­i­mate dis­ci­pli­nary mea­sures where cir­cum­stances war­rant them.

It al­so said po­lice in­ter­ven­tion may be nec­es­sary when se­ri­ous vi­o­lence threat­ens the safe­ty of a school com­mu­ni­ty.

How­ev­er, the as­so­ci­a­tion said safer schools re­quire more than re­mov­ing or polic­ing stu­dents.

“Safe schools re­quire more than re­moval, sus­pen­sion or polic­ing. They re­quire a func­tion­ing sys­tem of pre­ven­tion, in­ter­ven­tion, sup­port and re­ha­bil­i­ta­tion,” TTUTA said in a me­dia re­lease on Wednes­day.

The as­so­ci­a­tion is call­ing for strength­ened guid­ance and stu­dent sup­port ser­vices, in­clud­ing so­cial work­ers and men­tal-health pro­fes­sion­als, as well as ear­ly in­ter­ven­tion, con­flict res­o­lu­tion and vi­o­lence-pre­ven­tion pro­grammes.

It is al­so call­ing for greater parental and com­mu­ni­ty in­volve­ment, im­proved phys­i­cal se­cu­ri­ty and safer school in­fra­struc­ture, and clear pro­to­cols gov­ern­ing po­lice in­ter­ven­tion in schools.

“We can­not ar­rest, sus­pend or ex­pel our way out of school vi­o­lence,” TTUTA said.

“Stu­dents and ed­u­ca­tors must first be pro­tect­ed, but the un­der­ly­ing caus­es of vi­o­lent be­hav­iour must al­so be ad­dressed if we are se­ri­ous about pre­vent­ing its re­cur­rence.”

TTUTA said it had raised many of these con­cerns and pro­posed so­lu­tions in the past but had not re­ceived the lev­el of mean­ing­ful en­gage­ment it be­lieves is nec­es­sary.

The as­so­ci­a­tion has called on Ed­u­ca­tion Min­is­ter Dr Michael Dowlath to re­spond to its cor­re­spon­dence and en­gage TTUTA in mean­ing­ful con­sul­ta­tion.

“School safe­ty is too im­por­tant for stake­hold­ers to work in iso­la­tion,” it said.

How­ev­er, Cou­va South MP and Leader of Gov­ern­ment Busi­ness Bar­ry Padarath has thrown his sup­port be­hind Prime Min­is­ter Kam­la Per­sad-Bisses­sar’s tough stance on school vi­o­lence, say­ing par­ents must take greater re­spon­si­bil­i­ty for their chil­dren’s be­hav­iour.

Padarath said the Gov­ern­ment was ac­tive­ly pur­su­ing parental re­spon­si­bil­i­ty leg­is­la­tion, with the pol­i­cy frame­work cur­rent­ly un­der re­view.

He said the leg­is­la­tion would be aimed at ad­dress­ing the re­spon­si­bil­i­ties of par­ents whose chil­dren re­peat­ed­ly en­gage in se­ri­ous mis­con­duct.

Padarath said the Gov­ern­ment sup­port­ed the Prime Min­is­ter’s po­si­tion that stu­dents who can­not be­have in schools should be sent home to their par­ents.

He crit­i­cised TTUTA, the Na­tion­al Par­ent-Teacher As­so­ci­a­tion and the Op­po­si­tion for what he de­scribed as a fail­ure to ad­vance mean­ing­ful so­lu­tions to school vi­o­lence over the past decade.

Padarath al­so de­fend­ed the pres­ence of po­lice of­fi­cers in schools, ar­gu­ing that their role is to pro­tect stu­dents and teach­ers from se­ri­ous vi­o­lence.

He said the Gov­ern­ment would not back away from its ap­proach to school safe­ty, adding that up­com­ing par­lia­men­tary busi­ness would in­clude leg­is­la­tion aimed at ad­dress­ing con­cerns about the be­hav­iour of young peo­ple.

Padarath said decades of pro­grammes and poli­cies tar­get­ing at-risk youth had failed to elim­i­nate school vi­o­lence and ar­gued that par­ents must ac­cept re­spon­si­bil­i­ty for their chil­dren’s be­hav­iour.

“If you as a par­ent can­not put a han­dle on your child’s be­hav­iour, then you have failed your child,” he said.

TTUTA, mean­while, said it re­mained will­ing to work with the Min­istry of Ed­u­ca­tion, law en­force­ment, par­ents and oth­er stake­hold­ers to build safer schools.

“No ed­u­ca­tor should teach in fear. No child should learn in fear,” the as­so­ci­a­tion said.

“Let us move be­yond rhetoric and work to­geth­er to cre­ate the learn­ing en­vi­ron­ment our ed­u­ca­tors and chil­dren de­serve.”