Preventing child abuse at schools is the responsibility of school authorities

Preventing child abuse at schools is the responsibility of school authorities

These days the most consistent news on a daily basis is shockingly the rape cases. Not a single day passes when we don’t come across molestation news on the newspapers of India. Most of the victims of these horrendous crimes are minors; children who have hardly looked into the realm beyond their parents and teachers. Innocence of the future of the country is brutally being killed and the most shameful part is when these crimes happen within their Alma Mater, the place where parents send their children with a trust for education and better future. Are the schools not responsible when such heinous crimes happen within the school premises?

Yes, it is the responsibility of the school:

1. Providing sex education has been mandatory in schools but what when the tutors themselves are the culprit? Is this what they lay before the students to look upon? Schools must ensure that they hire teachers only after properly scrutinizing the background of the teacher and the records of the previous schools where the teacher had worked before. There have been shocking cases of rape accused teachers getting hired in other schools due to lack of background check. It is extremely important that selection of teachers should be done with utmost care.

2. We frequently come across cases where the school/college authorities simply refuse to utter a word in these matters. It is their fear of losing reputation that they completely deny the responsibility of the authorities in these cases. A few reports by the parents of the physically abused child revealed that the principals of the schools threatened them to keep silent about it and not raise a complaint.

3. Ever read the admission broachers of these schools? They proudly boast of security measures and CCTV cameras installed within the school premises. Some schools do follow these security measures seriously while the others simply bluff to get the parents to trust them and leave the precious years of their child’s life in the hands of those who do not care at all. Proper surveillance is the responsibility of the schools.

4. A school full of teachers and students, all of them aware of rules and laws, becomes the spot for child abuse and nobody notices. Does this appear practically correct? Other members of the staff should take these incidents seriously and prevent them from happening if they ever come across anything that’s abnormal or is wrong for any reason.

5. Child abuse can also be in the form of bullying. The not so popular students of a class face constant comments from the teachers, some of them meant to promote the interest of the child towards studies and the others are simply meant to torment the child. Schools must ensure that the teachers know their limits well and there should be no exceptions in these laws even if it meant to promote the development of the child.

No, there should be preventive measures:

1. We are all aware of the atrocious crime of child abuse but are we really being preventive about it? Parents need to open up to their child and teach them the differences between good and bad touch and how they should act when they are faced with any such abuse in school, home or anywhere else. Prevention is better than cure and parents must take these preventive measures, give their child sex education, and ensure them that no matter what they will always be there for them. This will give confidence to the child to come to you when he/she senses anything that is wrong.

2. In this busy world when both parents are working, not that I find anything wrong in it, a gap is created between parents and child and the daily conversations gets lost somewhere. Parents must ensure that they have a talk with their child everyday about their times at school, playground, with friends, or in tuition classes.

3. Even when parents notice that their child has been abused physically or mentally by a school teacher, only 50% of them actually report the crime. The rest would rather change the child’s school for the fear of going through humiliation and the hassles of going through legal procedure. They must remember that though they believe they are keeping their child secure by changing school, there are many other children might have to go through the same or even worse situation if the criminal is not punished.

Conclusion:

It is the prime responsibility of parents to teach their children the differences between appropriate and inappropriate behaviors and ways to get out of such situations. However, school authorities must also ensure that they do the screening of the faculties before hiring them and encourage staff as well as children to protest any inappropriate behavior from anyone, be it teacher, seniors, or even school principal.