All posts tagged school

Kiri Te Kanawa beaten by nuns

Violence in New Zealand used to be a normal part of New Zealand society. Many of the effects of this continue, as does much violence.

Today it’s hard to imagine nuns being violent but there have been many claims of violence in religious institutions and schools.

Kiri Te Kanawa claims to have been beaten by nuns at school.

NZ Herald reports Dame Kiri Te Kanawa: ‘I was beaten by the nuns as a child’

“I’m tough … I’m tough because I have had to be. I was beaten by the nuns as a child.”

Dame Kiri Te Kanawa’s revelation stunned an audience of several hundred in Whanganui.

The celebrated singer, in the city to teach at the two-week New Zealand Opera School at Wanganui Collegiate, was speaking candidly in a public conversation with fellow international opera performer and Baptist Church minister, Rodney McCann.

“I am as tough as I am today because from age 12, when I was at a convent school in Auckland, I was beaten by the nuns,” Dame Kiri told the audience at the Collegiate auditorium.

Some aspects of our society have changed markedly for the better in my lifetime. It would be unthinkable to hear of nuns beating children now.

Unfortunately some in our society continue perpetuating the violence they learnt as normal behaviour as children, and pass that on to their own children.

We have a long way to go before we can become relatively non-violent society.

by Pete George on January 18, 2016  •  Permalink
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Posted by Pete George on January 18, 2016

https://yournz.org/2016/01/18/kiri-te-kanawa-beaten-by-nuns/

Police fail to act against abuse of drunk girls

The failure of the police to charge offenders who deliberately got young girls drunk, took compromising photos and posted them online is very disappointing.

NZ Herald reports: Warnings for Roast Busters II

“The boys had a competition where they would get young girls drunk and they would dangle their genitalia over their faces and take photos,” he said.

“The competition was how many girls you could get into those compromising photos.”

“The police were involved. The boys involved received a warning and weren’t prosecuted.”

It may be that the schoolboys involved have been thought to have been dealt with adequately outside of the courts, but this sends a terrible message.

And if one of my daughters or grand daughters was abused like this and it appeared that the offenders were let off lightly I’d be very annoyed.

If the police ever do decide to send a message and prosecute appalling behaviour like this the offenders may be unlucky to have been chosen to be example setters.

But it’s far worse for past and future victims if this sort of behaviour is swept under society’s carpet.

New Zealand Secondary Principals’ Association executive member Patrick Walsh, chairman of a high-powered Government group to counter cyber-bullying among school students, is dismayed no one was prosecuted.

Walsh, who declined to reveal the school involved, was told of the incident by the principal of the teens’ school.

I think the school was revealed in initial media reports when this story broke.

“What they are doing is criminal and totally unacceptable. In my view they do need to be charged, convicted and a message [sent] to teenagers across the country that this is totally unacceptable.”

I agree.

Police would not comment on the case but said: “We take all allegations of sexual misconduct and assault very seriously and investigate them appropriately.”

That’s not how it looks here.

Walsh said the the cases backed disturbing findings from an earlier survey that showed the Roast Busters case was not an isolated incident.

He said the time had come to stop a destructive teen culture, adding there was a hardcore group of schoolboys who thought they were entitled to harass, bully and intimidate others using technology.

“I don’t think they should go to prison. [Instead] fines, community work and compulsory attendance at programmes to address their attitude should be part of the penalty.”

Parents and schools have a responsibility to make it clear to children and pupils that abusive behaviour like this is totally unacceptable.

Auckland University law lecturer Dr Bill Hodge said there was scope under the new Harmful Digital Communications Act to put the statute to the test in incidents like those.

“This seems worse than bullying but it would seem to fit into that and would be something worth exploring,” said Hodge.

But it needs the police to actually act appropriately and deal to behaviour like this.

by Pete George on November 8, 2015  •  Permalink
Posted in Crime
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Posted by Pete George on November 8, 2015

https://yournz.org/2015/11/08/police-fail-to-act-against-abuse-of-drunk-girls/

Turei versus Key on feeding kids in schools

There was a continuation of a running battle between Metiria Turei and John Key in Question Time today.

Later after a “feed the kids bill in her name (that she took over from as Hone Harawira) was defeated in Parliament by 59 votes to 61 at its first reading, @metiria tweeted:

John Key today turned his back on hungry kids.

A second bill on feeding kids at school is also being voted on. NZ Herald:

Meanwhile another food in schools bill in the name of Labour MP David Shearer is set to be defeated tonight at its first reading as well.

The bill allowed for free food in all primary and intermediate decile one to three schools that wanted.

However during his research on the bill, Mr Shearer came across several schools that changed his thinking including Yendarra School in Otara, and Owairaka District School, which took a community approach to food in schools.

“I have become convinced that free food solves nothing,” he has said.

“I now believe that each school community should be resourced to find and deliver its own long-term food solutions.”

He still wanted the bill sent to a select committee so it could be reworked.

It failed 60-60 despite Peter Dunne supporting it: Vote on that Members Bill (David Shearer’s Feed The Kids) was tied 60-60. Under Standing Order 153, a tied vote is lost.

This is not an issue of feeding hungry kids or not, it’s a matter of how much and how kids should be given food in schools. The Question Time exchange illustrates this.

[Sitting date: 18 March 2015. Volume:704;Page:5. Text is subject to correction.]

4. METIRIA TUREI (Co-Leader—Green) to the Prime Minister : Does he stand by his statement that the principals of decile 1 to 4 schools he has visited have told him “the number of children in those schools who actually require lunch is the odd one or two”?

Rt Hon JOHN KEY (Prime Minister): Yes , because that is what principals have told me.

Metiria Turei : How can it be correct that only the odd one or two kids in low-decile schools require lunch when KidsCan says that, on average, 23 percent of the children in the schools it works with are in need of lunch every day?

Rt Hon JOHN KEY : Well, I believe it to be true, and one of the issues I raised with the Minister of Education today was to ask her whether she, in her travels as the Minister of Education in the last 3½ years, had had the issue of lunch in schools raised with her. She told me that it has either never been raised or has been raised extremely infrequently.

Metiria Turei : Is the Prime Minister telling the House that the low-decile schools that he has visited do not have the same needs as other low-decile schools that KidsCan works with?

Rt Hon JOHN KEY : What I am telling the member is that, firstly, the Government has been working with a number of private sector organisations to provide breakfast in schools, and about 800—791, I think—schools out of 2,500, approximately, have taken that up. Secondly, I think there will be some children who go to school without lunch, but I think that number is actually relatively small. In some cases it will be one or two; in some cases it will be a few more, but I do not think it is as widespread as the member is purporting it to be.

Metiria Turei : I seek leave to table a document from KidsCan showing that it is now feeding 15,000 students a week across 448 schools, an average of 33 children in each—

Mr SPEAKER : Order! The document is now being described. The date of the document would be useful.

Metiria Turei : The date of the document is 3 March 2015.

Mr SPEAKER : March 2015—is there any objection to that information being tabled? There is none. It can be tabled.

  • Document, by leave, laid on the Table of the House.

Metiria Turei : I seek leave to table a document prepared by my office on the schools that John Key visited from 2013 to 2014, showing that of the decile 1 schools and decile—

Mr SPEAKER : Order! No, I—[Interruption] Order! The member will resume her seat. This is an effective way of making a political statement. It does not have the purpose of informing the House. It will not be tabled.

Metiria Turei : Which of the decile 1 and 2 schools that John Key visited—Māngere Central, Waimate Main, Flaxmere, Huntly, Huntly College, Manaia View, Pt England—told him that only one or two of their kids needed feeding every day, when each of those schools have a lunch programme provided by either KidsCan or some other charity in their community?

Rt Hon JOHN KEY : Well, by definition, I suppose, if they already have lunch provided, then actually they would not raise the fact that they need lunch, so that is rather self-defeating. Secondly, it may be lost on the member, but I have been the Prime Minister since the end of 2008. The question the member asked was for the 1 year from 2013. But in the interests of trying to get to the bottom of this debate, at 1.41 this afternoon I took the liberty of ringing the Minister of Education. I said: “Please ring for me three schools that are decile 1 or 2 and ask them how many kids have not come to school today with lunch.” That was done completely randomly and with no information. Here are the facts. Phillip Heeney of Te Kura Kaupapa Māori o Te Waiu o Ngati Porou , Ruatōria, a decile 1 school—people are free to ring the school—

Metiria Turei : I raise a point of order, Mr Speaker.

Mr SPEAKER : Order! [Interruption ] Order! Every member has a right to raise a point of order. It will be heard in silence—[Interruption ] Order! The member will resume her seat. I repeat, because I was interrupted, that every member has a right to raise a point of order. This one will be heard in silence, but I sincerely hope that it is a valid point of order.

Metiria Turei : That was not an answer to the question that I asked. I asked—

Mr SPEAKER : Order! The member will resume her seat. It is very much an answer to the question the member asked. She can shake her head, but it is me who has got to adjudicate on this. It was a very full answer; it was quite a lengthy question. The House will later on today devote a considerable amount of time to this issue, and I feel it is in the interests of the House that the Prime Minister be allowed to complete his answer.

Rt Hon JOHN KEY : As I said, at 1.41 p.m., with absolutely no knowledge, these are the facts. At Te Waiu o Ngati Porou school, Ruatoria, decile 1, how many children came to school today without lunch—answer, zero. Barbara Ala’Alatoa, Sylvia Park School, decile 2—one to two kids, maybe. Iain Taylor, Manurewa Intermediate—decile 1 school, roll of 711—maybe 12. Yes, there is an issue where some children come to school without lunch. That number of children is relatively low.

Metiria Turei : So why, then, did the Prime Minister refuse my invitation to visit Windley School this morning, where we fed with peanut butter and jam sandwiches, some 50 kids at lunchtime; where Windley School says it feeds some 50 every day, Kelvin Road School some 50 every day; Cosgrove Primary up to 40 kids every day; Hay Park around 12 kids lunch every day; and Kelston Girls’, which was recently on Campbell Live showing just how serious the problem is—why will he not come with me to visit those schools that do have a problem so that he can see it for himself?

Rt Hon JOHN KEY : As I said to the member last week when she was trying to tell this House that 90 percent of children went to school without lunch, and had to then come back and apologise for being wrong, I am happy to go to a school of my choosing. Secondly, I note that the member, when she tweeted the picture, did so with an apron for the KickStart Breakfast programme that the Government is running. This is a Government that has provided 3.4 million breakfasts. This is a Government that is working with the private sector to help deliver that, from Fonterra through to Sanitarium. They are the same breakfast programmes where principals tell me—

Mr SPEAKER : Order! The answer now is long enough.

Metiria Turei : I seek leave to table a document from the Parliamentary Library showing that the GST on $1.29 is 19c not 2c.

Mr SPEAKER : Again, the purpose of tabling documents is to inform the proceedings of the House. Members know current GST rates. I am not about to put that leave.

Metiria Turei : Why does the Prime Minister continue to mock and downplay the seriousness of the problem, maintaining yet again that only the odd one or two kids need lunch at school when schools know he is wrong, KidsCan knows he is wrong, and more important, the kids who come to school hungry know he is wrong?

Rt Hon JOHN KEY : The Government has been very focused on this issue for a long period of time. It is actually proud of its record. It has extended Fruit in Schools for a huge number of children. It provides breakfasts in schools alongside the private sector. This is an issue that, as I said to the member and I repeat again, I raise with pretty much every school I go to, and the same response is what I always get—about 15 percent of kids want to take up the breakfast programme, a very small number need lunch, and when they come to school without lunch the school provides them with lunch. It does so out of its breakfast programme for the odd lunch it provides. At the end of the day I think the member actually does a disservice to the fantastic parents and caregivers out there, the overwhelming bulk of whom actually do provide their kids with breakfast and lunch. They do a damn good job, and the member should stop telling them that they do not.

Metiria Turei : Given that the Prime Minister missed the opportunity this morning to talk with parents, charity workers, and the kids over a lunch programme, will he commit to visiting Windley School—and if not Windley School then to any school that KidsCan suggests he goes to visit—and making the peanut butter and jam sandwiches for the kids—

Mr SPEAKER : Order! [Interruption ] Order! The question is too long. The Prime Minister can answer the essence of the question.

Rt Hon JOHN KEY : I have been to numerous schools where KidsCan has been in operation. I have been to those schools with Julie on numerous occasions. This is actually the Government that gave KidsCan $500,000 more for raincoats, and $900,000 more to deal with headlice. We are providing extensive support. But I will say this. I went to one of the schools where every child was given a raincoat, and, yes, we fully supported that. The argument around that is that children do not have raincoats. So I actually asked about 20 of the kids: “Do you own a raincoat?” Every single child told me: “Yes.” So it is great they have got another one, and we support KidsCan and we are giving them money, and we think they are a great charity, and they are doing good work, but just because you give kids a raincoat does not mean they did not own one beforehand.

by Pete George on March 18, 2015  •  Permalink
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Posted by Pete George on March 18, 2015

https://yournz.org/2015/03/18/turei-versus-key-on-feeding-kids-in-schools/

Dotcom’s boarding school in a castle

There’s been some nitpicking at The Standard about Kim Dotcom’s childhood schooling – with implications that attending a boarding school in a castle doesn’t detract from an ‘impoverished’ childhood.

At the Mana conference Dotcom spoke:

“My mother had to work three jobs to feed us. I would go to bed hungry, often, and I would eat toast with sugar, and I would eat toast with ketchup”.

That may refer to earlier in his childhood – family circumstances can change, and at some stage Dotcom’s parents divorced.

Die Welt on Kim Schmitz/Dotcom suggests that Dotcom’s childhood wasn’t all hardship.

He is reported as getting his first computer when he was nine (in 1983 computers weren’t cheap) and at twelve he ran ten phone lines out of his bedroom.

Die Velt said “Kim wurde auf das Plöner Schlossinternat geschickt” – he was sent to the boarding school at Plön Castle.

Staatliche Internat Schloss Plön – a state boarding school, as the links show it’s not an ordinary city or town high school, it was a boarding school located at an historic castle.

A German source has described an Internat as a “special school for special children”.

In Germany children started school at six in Hauptschule. The most academic children were moved to a Gymnasium (like Internat Schloss Plön) usually at nine years old until eighteen.

See Plön Castle and Schloss Plön.

In 1969 Der Spiegel said it cost 300 marks per month to attend Internat Schloss Plön. If Dotcom attended it would have been in the eighties. It’s possible he could have had a scholarship.

Court documents from his first arrest in 1994 confirm he attended Internat Schloss Plön from second year (usually 10 years old), he advanced a year and  graduated at 17 with a better than normal diploma. It sounds like he was a smart child.

It wasn’t an ordinary school for average or impoverished German kids.

The translation described the school as ‘posh’ – Die Velt wrote “Kim wurde auf das Plöner Schlossinternat geschickt”. That doesn’t say “posh”. The translator may have assumed posh because Schlossinternat implies a flasher then normal school, a boarding school in a castle.

After he left school he lived in an apartment and was given an allowance of 1200 marks per month by his mother who was now with a stepfather. That’s a substantial allowance. He wouldn’t live with his father due to alcohol problems.

Die Velt also says Dotcom got his first computer when he was 9. That was 1983, even basic computers weren’t cheap then, a ZX81 was about $300 in New Zealand but to expand from a paltry 1 kb of RAM to 16 kb cost about another $200.

Die velt says “Three years later, well before the World Wide Web was available to everyone, Schmitz used 12 telephone lines to hack into other computers” – Dotcom would have been 12 then, obviously with some resources.

This barely scratches the surface of Dotcom’s childhood, but it doesn’t sound like an average Mana family lifestyle.

by Pete George on April 15, 2014  •  Permalink
Posted in Politics
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Posted by Pete George on April 15, 2014

https://yournz.org/2014/04/15/dotcoms-boarding-school-in-a-castle/

Letting kids play like kids

Dunedin’s The Star has a front page article on Free play pays, schools say (view here). It’s about schools involved in a study to see if there are benefits in letting kids play like kids at school rather than protecting them in nanny school cotton wool.

Four Dunedin schools have thrown away the rule book and given their pupils more freedom on the playing field, leading to more skinned knees but more active and focussed pupils.

Kids who can let of steam in the playground do better in the classroom – and disrupt other kids less.

(Schools) took part in a University of Otago study into how relaxing playground rules would affect physical activity.

The two year multidisciplinary “Play Study” finished last year but both schools (that agreed to interviews) have kept the hands-off approach and allow pupils more freedom during lunch and breaks.

The results of the study have not yet been published but both principals said while it was hard to say for certain if more activity in then playground led to more attention in the classroom, so far it seemed to have worked.

Play Study co-ordinator Victoria Farmer, a senior research technician at the University of Otago, said researchers had been surprised by the enthusiasm for the project.

It just shows what people have been saying for a long time about being too careful with children and the benefits of letting themselves go and learn for themselves.

The enthusiasm shouldn’t be a surprise. Suppressing the natural enthusiasm of children to explore, experiment and play has been misguided.

There have also been potential issues reported on whether things like sun protection go too far. Sometimes paranoai seems to predominate.

What have the kids been allowed to do?

One of the most popular changes the school made was to allow pupils outside when it rained. The school bought 50 pairs of gumboots and 50 raincoats and pupils were encouraged to bring wet-weather gear from home.

“When it rains these kids can still get outside and jump in puddles and splash each other and burn off all that excess energy”.

In the old days we used to do that on the way too and from school. Now it’s usually the parent’s cars and SUVs driving through the puddles.

The study changed the way the schools thought about play.

Instead of complex playground equipment pupils now climbed trees or made their own fun with objects like concrete tunnels and old tyres. Pupils were more active than before.

Pupils were allowed to climb trees up to a certain height, which led them to create a game where they tried to climb from tree to tree without touching the ground.

Trees, logs, they were common parts of my childhood. A log could be a truck, a ship, whatever we wanted it to be. We built tree huts ourselves. We dug underground huts. We dug caves. Obviously the building and digging wasn’t at school.

Today there is too much cotton wool, too much electronics, too much plastic, too much manufactured “fun”. This starts from birth where toys and activity centres with every colour and bell and whistle imaginable clutter babies senses.

Children commonly have more toys before their first birthday than I had in my entire childhood.

We have a society where too much is provided to our kids and they are prevented from doing things for themselves and exploring their imaginations.

Maybe this study is a sign that the tide may be starting to turn on a cotton wooled molly coddled society.

by Pete George on February 1, 2014  •  Permalink
Posted in Politics
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Posted by Pete George on February 1, 2014

https://yournz.org/2014/02/01/letting-kids-play-like-kids/

There’s poverty and there’s NZ ‘poverty’

Euan Ross-Taylor  questions the use of the term ‘poverty’ in a New Zealand context, and suggests how the problem of hungry kids could be dealt with. He commented at Whale Oil:

Poverty is what needs to be addressed – not child poverty. Parents need to be taught that purchase of ‘luxury’ items when children go without basics is child neglect.

And also:

I want to add here that I spent 10 years working with true poverty overseas among the homeless (squattors).

The language being used by people over our ‘hungry’ children in NZ is silly. They are not as far as I have been made aware , ‘starving’. They go to school without eating breakfast. They are being fed the wrong diet.

My children did not eat breakfast before going to school. They are at university now and still choose not to eat what I would consider a proper breakfast, but then I was brought up on a farm where there were chores to be done before breakfast everyday. We enjoyed our breakfast.

As much as I do not want to put more work on teachers, I do think that identifying children who are hindered in their learning because of being hungry is/should be part of successful teaching practise.

Having a social worker attached to each school to follow up with the identified families would be much more helpful than blanket feeding programs.

If the families of these kids still continue their neglect, the social workers could have a budget to provide lunchbags to the said kids on arriving at school, until such time as the parents of said kids could be convinced one way or another to provide better for their children.

I can’t see why this is so difficult.

Sounds like a considered, sensible approach to me.

by Pete George on May 11, 2013  •  Permalink
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Posted by Pete George on May 11, 2013

https://yournz.org/2013/05/11/theres-poverty-and-theres-nz-poverty/

Dunne won’t “Feed the Kids”

Hone Harawira has a Feed the Kids bill:

The Bill aims to set up government funded breakfast and lunch programmes in all decile 1-2 schools.

The Bill is expected to come before Parliament for its first reading on Wednesday 5 June.  So far Labour, Greens, Maori Party, NZ First, and Independent MP Brendan Horan have agreed to support it.  We need one more vote to get it passed and to a select committee for further consideration.

Peter Dunne’s vote would be the one that makes the difference to get this bill passed on the first vote. I asked him if he would support it. Dunne responded:

I fully understand what is intended by this essentially laudable proposals, but I think it is fundamentally flawed for a number of reasons.

Of course, there is a significant number of children who go to school to hungry, because they have not been properly fed at home, and of course poor nutrition has an adverse effect on learning and the subsequent development of the child. That is not the issue – rather, the question is what is the best way of addressing this problem.

At one level, the idea of meals in schools is superficially attractive, but it is essentially palliative, and does little to deal with the circumstances of these children on a long term basis.

Then there is the question of which group of children should we be focusing on. After all, not all children in schools will come from the same socio-economic backgrounds. So, should such a programme be applied universally, which would be as expensive as it would be impractical, or should it be more tightly targeted?

And if so, how? Should, for example, it just apply in low decile schools, even though there will children in those schools from a higher socio-economic status who would not need such a programme?

In that event, what about low-income household children in higher decile schools? Or, to get around income definition problems, should the children of beneficiaries be the only ones eligible?

Whatever way one looks at the issue, the definitional problems are massive, and strongly suggest that such a programme would not only be unsustainable, but also impractical, and in a number of cases potentially inequitable.

That is why I take the view that a much more realistic and workable approach is to target directly, through early identification by community agencies, at risk families and to work with them to help them  get the support they need to properly feed their children.

That support could take any number of forms, depending on individual circumstances, including direct assistance with the provision of food, at one end of the scale, through to such things as life skills advice on cooking, for example, and proper budget advice at the other end of the scale.

Such a targeted approach is far more likely to succeed in the long term, and benefit directly at-risk children, and would have my full support. 

So that looks like a no for the Harawira bill.

Dunne makes a strong argument for a far more targeted approach at the source of the problems (and there are multiple problems that need addressed).

by Pete George on May 7, 2013  •  Permalink
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Posted by Pete George on May 7, 2013

https://yournz.org/2013/05/07/dunne-wont-feed-the-kids/

A teacher’s view on hungry kids

On a 3 News blog by Lachlan Forsyth – A poverty of ideas:

Annie G  commented:

It really concerns me I am a teacher of 37 years working in a decile 1 school and I know that much of this comes from inadequate ignorant parenting.

Whilst I agree kids with empty bellies are bad news I am concerned that feeding them at school at an added cost to the tax payer is breeding yet another generation of needy unable to cope and support a family people.

I used to run a food supply at my school during a prolonged freezing work strike. It ended because I knew parents were using it as an easy option.

We need to put money in to:

  1. Getting parents out of bed in the morning to feed their kids.
  2. Teaching parents that a baked potato for example is better than noodles or expensive cereal.
  3. To leave food for the kids set up on the table if they cant be there in the morning due to working hours / whatever.
  4. Feeding the kids is NOT the responsibility of the tax payer.
  5. Money for drugs and alcohol is NOT a priority.
  6. Bring back basic cooking and budgeting lessons. Not the “technology type of clap trap taught today.

Surely some of the money Iwi have received in Treaty settlement could go towards educating the parents and feeding the kids.

Sadly many sympathetic New Zealandrs who think feeding kids at school is the way to deal with this issue have had no experience of the inadequacy of many of our kids parents. Some parents need to think about where when and how they spend their benefit $$

I know of many low income wage earning kiwis who struggle to feed their kids but they manage as they think about where the priorities lie.

John Key travels whilst NZ falls deeper in to the mire of poverty and lack of vision.

Vicki responds:

Annie G you are wrong, there isn’t enough money on a low wage or benefit to pay housing, power and then food on top. The typical low income or benefit covers housing, power, petrol ..there is nothing left after that for food.

Also the majority of beneficaries are only short term, long term benefit use is a small minority….you seem to be prejudice against certain people, but the fact is, working or not food and housing is so insanely expensive something has to be done to help these kids.

And Katrina respionds to that:

Vicki I don’t think Annie G is being prejudice, she sounds like she knows what she is talking about after having been at the coal face.

Anyone in a school environment on a regular basis sees the variety of parents within a school. Some are genuine people who have fallen on temporary hard times and some parents really are of a different mentality where they expect everyone else to do everything.

We see this different attitude in schools that are a higher decile as well the attitude is the same just the bank balance is different.

by Pete George on September 11, 2012  •  Permalink
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Posted by Pete George on September 11, 2012

https://yournz.org/2012/09/11/a-teachers-view-on-hungty-kids/

Solving the hungry kids at school problem

Solving child poverty – make the fat kids give half their school lunch to the impoverished kids, and solve the obesity problem at the same time.

Call it a consumption tax.

More seriously, how would free food at school affect:

  • the obesity problem?
  • the bad parent problem?
  • the lazy kid in the morning problem?

I was often too late and lazy to bother about breakfast before school.

by Pete George on August 29, 2012  •  Permalink
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Posted by Pete George on August 29, 2012

https://yournz.org/2012/08/29/solving-the-hungry-kids-at-school-problem/

Culture of violence in schools

New Zealand’s culture of violence is spread through much of our society. That it is apparently protected by schools trying to protect their reputations at the cost of teacher and pupil safety is, if true, disgraceful.

The secret story of violence in schools

A teacher is punched in the face, another is shoved in the chest and their lunch stolen, one is regularly verbally abused while another has their car vandalised.  But at the schools’ request, none of it is reported to police.

Post-Primary Teachers Association president Robin Duff called the situation “intolerable”.

He said, in the PPTA News, the teachers’ union could not continue to be “complicit in this conspiracy of silence” that concealed the level of violence within schools.

He said competitiveness in schools gave them an incentive to hide issues of violence towards teachers and staff, and some schools didn’t want police involved because it could lead to negative publicity.

The national executive was “particularly concerned” to learn that some schools were actually forbidding teachers from reporting instances to police.

This is similar to families who keep violence secret to avoid exposing their reputation or mana to scrutiny. But…

The Secondary Principals’ Association was reluctant to support the  PPTA’s move.

President Patrick Walsh said he had not seen any evidence of a conspiracy of silence, nor was he aware of principals banning teachers from reporting assaults to police.

An open inquiry would find out if he’s right or not.

Walsh said some schools could be worried by bad publicity associated with assaults, but principals would be foolish to cover up violence against teachers because it could result in a personal grievance case against the school.

But there are serious claims that it’s happening.

Until we deal with our violence problems openly and honestly the culture will continue to ruin people’s lives – can it will continue to cost some lives.

Dirty school secrets, like dirty family secrets, need to be exposed and addressed. This takes courage, but it’s something we as a country need to do.

by Pete George on April 8, 2012  •  Permalink
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Posted by Pete George on April 8, 2012

https://yournz.org/2012/04/08/culture-of-violence-in-schools/