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New strategies to stem school violence
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ON a regular school day, close to 20,000 pupils are thrown onto the East/West corridor to look for transport. This takes place in a one-hour time-frame-between 2 p.m. and 3 p.m-and within a one mile radius. Education Minister, Esther Le Gendre, believes that this daily exodus is responsible for ’not only fights but other types of delinquent behaviour’ currently taking place. And because of this, the ’start and dismissal times of schools will be staggered’ along the East/ West corridor, Le Gendre said. Le Gendre made the statement after an emergency meeting was held with stakeholders at the Education Ministry’s Alexander Street, St Clair office yesterday. The meeting was called following the fatal stabbing of 18-year-old schoolboy Dillon Griffith on Monday. Griffith, a pupil of St Augustine Secondary School, was the second schoolboy to be killed in a four-day period. Last Friday, 13-year-old Malik Hillaire of Barataria Senior Comprehensive was stabbed following a school fight. Both killings took place along the East/West corridor. The staggering of school times is currently being used to help quell the feud between neighbouring schools El Dorado East and West Secondary. On Monday, the closing time of El Dorado East was changed to 3 p.m., while classes at El Dorado West have remained half-an-hour earlier. Apart from this strategy, Le Gendre said that shuttle services would be provided to the pupils at the two schools. Both strategies are aimed at preventing the majority of pupils exiting the schools from converging on the neighbouring streets at the same time. Le Gendre said that data from the Schools Violence Prevention Academy Programme between last September and August stated that ’while there are many incidents of indiscipline, incidents of violence are not common’. The programme was conducted in 25 hand-picked schools. Le Gendre said that the ’stringent programme of scanning’ students had directly caused the decrease in the use of weapons on school compounds. However, Le Gendre said that security officials were not allowed to scan schoolchildren off the school’s compound. (Trinidad Express) |
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