The Impact of Crime among Learners in High School

Abstract

The issue of crime committed at school is escalating among high school learners and this is a serious issue in South Africa as it has turned to be contagious to the neigbouring schools. The qualitative study assessed the impact of crime among high school learners, their parents and teachers as well. The open-ended questionnaires were distributed to 38 learners in two high schools in Alice, Eastern Cape, 19 learners from each school. Simple random sampling was used to select respondents. Sub-topics of questionnaires were divided in to three sections: biographical information, the causes of crime among learners, and the impact of crime in schools. The data was analysed using content analysis. The results of this study indicated that this crime may be caused mainly by poor role modelling at home by parents/ guardians, by significant others such as the teachers and the older students through negative peer pressure. The impact of this crime may lead to victims dropping out of school due to fear of victimization by their fellow students and imprisonment by the perpetrators. Teachers are also affected by the crime in a way that they live with fear and insecure inside school premises because other learners carry dangerous weapons inside the school premises. Findings showed that crime does affect the learner’s in their studies and psychological; in a sense that crime scene always leaves post-traumatic stress disorders to the observers. It also promotes retaliation behaviour among the learners and they spent less time concentrating on their books. DOI: 10.5901/ajis.2014.v3n1p333