Bullying rife in FS schools

2005-06-02 13:34

Bloemfontein - Bullying among pupils was still common at schools and has been wrongly seen by many as a normal part of life, a Free State University (FSU) study has found.

Professor Corene de Wet, of the department of comparative education at FSU, said only five percent of teachers and 16% of pupils interviewed at Free State secondary schools said bullying was "no problem".

De Wet said pupils constantly hear from parents and adults they respect and love that "You should learn to take it", or "You should never sympathise with wimps", creating the impression that bullying was acceptable behaviour.

"This perception leads to unwillingness in victims to tell their parents or teachers that they were being bullied," De Wet said in an inaugural lecture on Wednesday night.

She said victims also fear retaliation from the bully or other pupils if they report being bullied.

"Many parents and teachers have no idea the levels of bullying their children and learners were experiencing," De Wet said.

She said nearly half of the secondary school pupils who that took part in the study had been victims of direct verbal harassment at least once a month.

"More than 32% of learners said that another learner had hit them in the past and a further 11.21% said they had been physically hurt at least once a week by another learner."

De Wet said bullying could be physical, verbal, emotional or even in friendship.

Bullying included punching, excessive tickling, direct vandalism, persistent teasing, gossip, racist remarks, deliberate exclusion from activities, blackmailing and sexual assault.

The study found that bullies and their victims were usually of the same sex. Physical harassment was not only perpetrated by boys.

"Several boys indicated that one or more girls injured them physically and a number of girls were injured by girls," De Wet said.

One boy said that his hostel roommate kicked him in the face regularly. He was too afraid to do something about the bully, because "his family was known for assaulting people".

According to a grade 12 girl, pupils are verbally bullied on a regular basis not only individually, but also as a group.

She wrote: "At our school there are these boys who are racists. They act mean against black people in our school. There is this particular group of boys in our maths class.

"When the teacher is out they take a red pen and write on the projector and spray it with spirits. It looks like blood and they would say it is AIDS and my friends and I have it."

The study also found that pupils felt more exposed to bullying in taxis and in school toilets.

De Wet said bullying was at times so subtle that it was difficult to describe.

A second study found that Free State teachers were also victims of bullying from pupils.

"Educator-targetted bullying is swearing and mocking the educator, knowingly ignoring the educator, making personal comments and even damaging the educator's property," De Wet said.

"It found that 24.8% of the respondents (teachers) were physically abused by their learners. About 33 percent were the victims of indirect verbal bullying and 18 percent were at one time or another sexually harassed by their learners."

De Wet said findings that teachers victimised pupils was even more disturbing, especially since the South African Council of Educators' code of conduct prohibits any form of abuse.

"It is alarming that 55.8% of teachers indicated that they had previously verbally victimised learners and that 50.31% of the respondents indicated that they had physically harassed learners in the past," she said.

De Wet said the findings of both studies hold serious implications for schools, because pupils had indicated they had no trust in teachers' ability to help them against bullying.

She said to counteract bullying at schools a multi-dimensional approach was needed.

- SAPA