OCCUPATIONAL VIOLENCE AGAINST SECONDARY SCHOOLS' TEACHERS IN ISMAILIA CITY

Abstract

Background and Aim of the Work. Violence at work has been identified as a serious problem in many countries all over the world. Violence against teachers has become a silent epidemic in education. Violence can lead to serious adverse health effects.It would be quite impossible for teachers to concentrate in their learning environment if they were suffering from any physical or psychological problems. This work was aimed at determining the prevalence, nature and consequences of physical and non-physical violence against secondary schools' teachers in Ismailia city, and investigatingthe potential associations between each form of violence and several teacher-related characteristics.Subjects and Methods. This cross sectional study was conducted at secondary schools in Ismailia city, including general, technical, agricultural, industrial, and commercial schools. Eligible teachers were those working for more than one year, and notsuffering from any neurological or psychiatric problems. The participant teachers were 1036. A self-administered anonymous questionnaire was used to assess violence against teachers. It covers questions concerning socio-demographic data, job related data and violence incidents; their characteristics, perpetrators, and associated factors.IntroductionViolence is a salient public health issue (Hamburg, 1998). Violence at work has dramatically gained momentum in recentyears and is now a priority concern in both industrialized and developing countries.Violence at work has been identifiedas a serious problem in many countries allover the world (Saarela, 2002). Occupational violence has resulted in physical and psychological damage, and even deaths (Saarela, 2002).The lack of a clear, concise definition of work-related violence is one of the problems in both tracking and addressing violence as a workplace health and safety Results. About three-fourth of studied teachers were exposed to workplace violence.More than half of them experienced covert violence while 15.8% experienced overt violence. Actual physical violence was experienced by 7.5% of the teachers. Near 15% of respondent teachers were stalked and 4.7% were sexually harassed. The majority of the stalked and sexually harassed participant teachers were victimized by students, then by other teachers, school administrators, parents or family members,and lastly other school members. The majority of incidents occurred in classrooms and during school time. Only one fourth of the incidents of stalking and sexually harassment were reported to school administrators. Participant teachers reported negative impacts of violence on their own educational career, physical, and emotional status. Logistic regression analysis has revealed that teachers of cultural subjects and teachers with good health status were statistically significantly more exposed to covert and overt assaults. Younger teachers and non-general secondary school teacherswere also more prone to covert type of violence. Male teachers and general secondary school teachers were more prone to overt type of violence. The predictors of stalking were longer duration of work in years, ill health, and exposure to overt violence. For sexual harassment, the predictors were exposure to overt violence and nonexposure to stalking.Conclusion. A significant proportion of secondary school teachers in Ismailia city are exposed to workplace violence, more covert than overt. A smaller proportion is exposed to stalking and sexual harassment. Predictors of violence against teachers included age, gender, experience years, health status, type of school, and subject specialty.There is need for intervention and prevention strategies to provide better quality of life and education for the future of the country.