Punishment in schools
Kubatana recently received an email from a subscriber describing an incident in which a young girl was badly beaten by school authorities. Our subscriber wanted to encourage debate and discussion on this issue:
1. Do schools have the right to ‘beat’ and I mean beat children?
2. Do they have the right to do so without the sanction of their parents (if indeed this makes it right at all)?
3. Does beating ever solve anything or will it only ensure that the child becomes an adult who beats?
4. Is authority best wielded through the stick?
5. Does the Ministry of Education approve of beating?
6. What sanction do parents have against their child being beaten?
7. What action can they take if the child is beaten and the parents disapprove?
8. How can one complain without making the child’s position even more vulnerable?
We asked our email subscribers for their feedback today, and some of their feedback includes:
I personally think it depends to what extent is the teacher beating the student. There should be some kind of a limit and areas to beat if it is discipline the student. If you are to see most of these big educated guys they went through all these kinds of treatment and most of them ended up doing well and worked within a disciplined order guided by code of good social behaiour.
If students are not to be beaten they are more chances of them misbehaving and the teacher will end up being reluctant to monitor the general behaviour of the students because he or she would not want to waste time on someone he or she has no control over.
If punishment of students in schools is to be approved and made known to the students, I believe the behavior of them will substantially improve and possibly yield better people for tomorrow.
- ML——
If anyone considers unfair and unreasonable treatment of children it should be in consideration of the Convention on the Rights of the Child and The Universal Declaration of Human Rights.
These instruments recognize that all human beings should be free, have freedom from fear and want, and are endowed with equal and inalienable rights. Accordingly, human rights are acknowledged as being universal, that is they apply everywhere, and inalienable, which means that they cannot be taken away from the person even with his or her agreement. In your brief there appears to be contravention of the following principle: -
The school should have respect for due process and the right to a fair hearing before taking any disciplinary measures. Any disciplinary measures should be proportionate and not involve physical punishment or inhuman or degrading treatment.
Environments characterized by activities that can affect or involve children may provide particular difficulties and high risk situations of violating or being complicit in human rights abuses. Schools may be faced with the need to make difficult and complex judgments on whether and how to conduct themselves.
The UDHR itself states that “every individual and every organ of society, keeping this Declaration constantly in mind, shall strive by teaching and education to promote respect for these rights and freedoms and by progressive measures, national and international, to secure their universal and effective recognition and observance.’’
An organization may be regarded as complicit if it in some way authorizes, tolerates or knowingly ignores abuses committed by the school. While case law is developing that is clarifying the legal liability of private organizations for complicity in international crimes, most of what society, business and human rights advocates understand as complicity goes beyond its present legal definition and application. The school and staff in their personal capacities may find they become isolated as international organizations (e.g. international finance or looking for another job) become risk averse if their complicity in turn may in any way entail liability under international law.
- TL
What do you think? Is there an “acceptable” level of beating? Or does all corporal punishment on students a violation of their rights? Email us your thoughts and opinions on info [at] kubatana [dot] net or leave us your comment here.
Thursday, August 13th 2009 at 12:44 pm
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Wednesday, August 19th 2009 at 9:54 am
I think we are taking the doctrine of human rights rather too far. If a teacher is striped of the power to enforce discipline he is striped of the power to guide and to educate. Teachers are daytime parents of our children and believe you me, majority of teachers have a burning passion to see their children excel. But when they are subjugated to the whims of school children, some of whom clearly are burnt of influencing the whole class to turn rebellious, then the teacher may end up folding his/her hands and wait for the cataclysmic demise of our dearly beloved children. Any wonder that we have more youths doing unthinkable things today than yesteryear. They lack of discipline home and away. The end result of this indiscipline, emanating from the perceived love and freedom flowing from the parents, is that we lose them to the grave, prison or some other undesirable place.
My message to teachers is that they should discipline school children as a parent would discipline his or her child. Discipline is not the other word for abuse. Abuse will always breed disorderly conduct, always remember that today’s victim of abuse is tomorrow’s perpetrator. let us therefore discipline out of love, not vengeance. F.M
Friday, September 4th 2009 at 6:29 pm
It is irresponsible of teachers to beat students. I believe the Ministry of Education policy is if the teacher thinks there is a need for a student to be beaten, the teacher has to discuss this with the head/deputy head and/or the parent, not just beat the child.
I taught in Zimbabwe schools for 15 years and I never beat a child, yet I managed to maintain classroom order. Because the students liked to come to my class, they were eager to learn. I had parents sometimes ask me to beat their child, even if the child was the best student, just to keep the child on track. I would tell them, I don’t beat my own children, I won’t beat yours. Furthermore, I am not a parent of my students, only their teacher.
I would not want my children beaten by a teacher. One a teacher slapped one of my daughter’s across the face. Another one told my first grader that she was making her sit by where the rats lived because she talked too much. I reported these incidences to the headmaster because I won’t tolerate such behavior from a teacher toward my child. I was happy for my first grader though who spoke up and said, “There are not rats you are just trying to scare me.” She is now an “A” student in finance at Penn State. The other one is at Stanford on full scholarship. It is amazing what a student/child treated with respect, empathy, understanding, and learning without fear at home and school can achieve.