Maroc - NEWSDAY.CO.TT - A la Une - Yesterday 10:44

Restoring peace in school

BOTH primary and secondary schools have become places where children fear peer violence and where teachers fear students, increasingly believing that they do not have the capacity to part fights or intervene in conflicts without becoming victims themselves. Numerous newspaper articles over the last decade document these growing feelings and worsening conditions. Teachers began reporting fear because gang activity and warring factions in communities were exacerbating threats, bullying, and fights between children. Teachers spoke of being cursed by students, splashed with urine and dirty water, and pelted with stones, pieces of concrete blocks, furniture, and garbage. Students reported injuries of varying levels of severity from a range of weapons, from scissors to knives. From Port of Spain to Penal, newspapers are full of stories of teachers, parents and students desperately calling for safe schools, but feeling that these fears and concerns were not taken seriously. This brings us to today, when both immediate and long-term solutions are necessary. How did we get here? The increase in societal violence inevitably became mirrored in our children’s lives. At the same time, one can point to a thousand specific policy failures – from the last government’s (and particularly the finance minister’s) refusal to sufficiently finance the Citizen Security Programme which was promoting peacebuilding and gang intervention in nearly 100 communities, to the paucity of social workers and guidance counsellors for schools. There are many state agencies and service providers doing excellent work. All will tell you that need far exceeds capacity to respond. Well-known problems exist in children’s lives, from trauma in families directly impacted by community violence and a spiralling murder rate to about 4,000 children each year comprising child abuse statistics which are dominated by neglect and sexual abuse, the latter particularly among girls. Nearly 10,000 women apply each year for orders of protection. What is the well-being of these children? When the previous minister of education refused to approve revisions to the Health and Family Life curricula to begin to address gender-based violence, I asked her what the government’s prevention strategy was – she said they would deal with issues of violence as perpetrated or experienced by children on a case-by-case basis. The rest was a closed door. It is important to know just how we reached. Now that we are here, we are divided between those desperate for security at any cost and those eternally advocating for longer-term restorative and trauma-informed strategies, which must also include addressing harmful gender ideals. State policy, particularly regarding children, makes most sense when it reflects evidence of best practices. Having armed police in schools is a policy decision that doesn’t rest on such compelling evidence. Indeed, as UNICEF observed in a 2023 working paper on armed and urban violence in Latin America and the Caribbean, police may be perceived “by children and adolescents as a very real threat to their lives and well-being, and that of their families.” In 2018, I reviewed peacebuilding approaches in six Caribbean countries, with a focus on women and youth. UNICEF’s Child Friendly School Initiative, rolled out across the region, and Jamaica’s Peace Management Initiative moved away from putative measures of discipline. Restore Belize’s approach included a social worker engaging directly with the caregiver of a child, doing home visits twice a month or more, participating in family meetings; conducting parenting classes; and doing school visits. This is what it takes. There was also an early intervention system for primary schools to identify at-risk children; train teachers to recognise family, health, neglect, hunger, literacy and abuse problems; and to respond through relationship-building so that schools recognise the stress children are experiencing and can become more compassionate, trauma-sensitive, and focused on overall well-being, rather than just discipline. As well, programmes across the region reported that children desire a feeling of being loved. This is echoed by the TTPS Hearts and Minds initiative and police youth clubs. Imagine. What they need is love. There are a myriad of established Caribbean initiatives, and significant local expertise. No need to reinvent the wheel. The challenge in transformative approaches is always will and financing. Yesterday, I listened to a breakfast radio host assert that there is an ideology that does not want to see schools improve – whether that is because of race, religion, geography or class or something more sinister in the government wasn’t clear, but such conjecture is dangerous and a result of poor communication about government strategy – if indeed there is one and, sooner rather than later, there should be. Diary of a mothering worker Entry 564 motheringworker@gmail.com The post Restoring peace in school appeared first on Trinidad and Tobago Newsday.