A symptom of deeper
problems, violence is in the spotlight in Romania’s schools.
In
October 2005, students at a high school in Constanta, Romania, caught on tape
scenes of an older teacher being physically and verbally abused by her students.
It was a troubling, but compelling story and the country’s media started the
hunt for other stories about violence in the schools.
And they found
them. In December, the front pages reported the attempted murder of a high
school student by her boyfriend, in the principal’s office. Two weeks later, in
a lower secondary school in Ploiesti, a 12-year-old boy was raped by two of his
classmates in the school toilet. Other violent incidents, which left some
children severely injured, also made the news.
The attention has led to
something unusual: dialogue. On 26 May, the University of Bucharest hosted the
first national conference on the subject, called Media, Violence and Education.
Representatives from the Education Ministry and local school districts attended,
as did members of parliament and high level journalists and media
managers.
Although new to the media spotlight, violence and bullying are
by no means new to Romania's schools. Acts of violence and harassment – students
fighting, teachers beating children with learning disabilities – are so common
they have come to be considered normal, even by the victims.
Still, there
are no reliable statistics about the problem. The only records are sketchy,
often recorded only because the police became involved. There is no national
database and no plans to create one. A 2001 UNICEF study cited “incidental
findings” suggesting an alarming trend of violence in schools.
Many
educators blame the media, citing violent movies, television programs, and news
reports, and shows on which guests who are morally compromised are treated like
Hollywood stars.
But the roots of violence in Romania’s schools, and
society, go deeper. Old sayings like “Beating comes from heaven” or “What is
beaten grows” represent moral guidelines for many parents and teachers. The same
UNICEF study found that 47 percent of parents in Romania “frequently resort to
beatings as punishment for their children.”
Add to that tendency a
surfeit of inadequately trained teachers, a shortage of counselors, interethnic
conflicts, and a tradition of denying the existence of problems and you have an
environment that almost guarantees violence will
flourish.
AN EXPLOSIVE MIX
Teacher training in Romania does not offer a
sufficient grounding in the fields of psycho-pedagogy and pedagogical practice,
and once in the classroom, young teachers are not required to seek further
training in the science of education. As a result, they often lack training in
subtle areas like body language, communication, and conflict
management.
Not surprisingly, many situations that might otherwise be
diffused end in violence. Communication difficulties between adults and children
generate tension and, sometimes, verbal or physical violence in classes. The
inability of many teachers to cope with such situations has become obvious in
media reports on school violence.
When things do get out of hand, there
is little psychological support for teachers or students. For example, in
Prahova County, with 120,000 students and 10,000 teachers, there are only 10
school psychologists, who have many bureaucratic responsibilities in addition to
dealing with children or teachers who need help. We can only speculate about how
many students and teachers with behavior problems could be helped significantly
through early psychological intervention, were it available.
A
particularly volatile source of violence in Romania's schools is interethnic
conflict, especially in communities with large numbers of Roma. Qualified
teachers do their best to avoid working there and parents who are able to send
their children elsewhere. These schools face high teacher turnover rates and
extremely low passing rates and become breeding grounds for truancy and
criminality.
The lack of effective communication between teachers, almost
always non-Roma, and students and parents is a potential source of tension and
violence in those schools. Police have had to respond to incidents of students
assaulting teachers or teachers beating students. These types of situations
require the use of school mediators from the Roma community, who have some
credibility. The process of building a team of such mediators has begun, but,
enmeshed in issues of mutual trust, it will take a long time.
Finally,
violence persists in schools because many officials do not want to admit it
exists. They fear the unfolding of a nightmare scenario: Teachers are labeled
incompetent. Parents of serious students transfer their children out. The school
enters a spiral of failure, with test scores dropping. In the end, it becomes a
place attended by only the most troublesome, under-achieving students and
avoided by qualified teachers. Hoping to escape that fate, an increasing number
of administrators have decided silence is best, adopting an attitude that has
its origins in Romania’s communist past.
BABY STEPS
Despite the
gloom, efforts are underway to fix the problem. Penalties for violent behavior
have been made harsher. Local councils, city halls, and education authorities
have begun to map clearer lines of responsibility, and, under pressure from
worried parents, administrators have welcomed police patrols and video
surveillance systems in many schools.
The Education Ministry has started
a process of legislative reform with the aim of hiring more psychologically fit
teachers. Currently, an examination by school psychologists is compulsory for
every teacher at the beginning of every school year; because of the huge number
of teachers and the shortage of psychologists, however, the usefulness of this
exam is questionable.
Officials must begin to compile a national database
of violent incidents, the necessity of which cannot be doubted. It would permit
a comprehensive analysis of the problem, including its economic and social
roots, and would help identify patterns in types of violence or areas of the
country needing the most attention. Then officials could begin to devise
meaningful strategies and tactics.
Until Romania starts to look at the
problem comprehensively, education will take a back seat to police work in many
of the country's schools.
Aurel
Graur is a school inspector in Romania who
has helped organize anti-violence training programs for teachers for the Council
of Europe.
Copyright © 2006 Transitions Online
An aristocratic title is not enough to ensure a noble behaviour. A person's greatness comes from acknowledging the mistakes and agreeing to correct them.
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