Violence In South African Schools Research Articles

Violence in South African Schools: Trends, psychology, and amelioration

Violence in South African Schools: Trends, psychology, and amelioration

Decrying violence in South African schools and higher institutions of learning

Decrying violence in South African schools and higher institutions of learning

What newspapers tell us about teacher-on-learner violence in South African schools

This small-scale qualitative study of newspapers’ portrayal of teacher-on-learner violence in South African schools is informed, firstly, by the World Health Organisation’s definition of violence and four of the World Health Organisation’s six main types of violence involving children and, secondly, by John Galtung’s theory of violence. South African media was used as a database for identifying South African English newspaper articles on teacher-on-learner violence. Qualitative content analysis was employed to systematically work through the identified newspaper articles. Five types of direct teacher-on-learner violence were identified: (1) The physical abuse of learners under the pretext of addressing learner misbehaviour; (2) the normalisation of the sexual abuse of learners by their teachers; (3) teachers’ use of words to systematically humiliate and tear down learners; (4) teachers’ negative stereotyping and discrimination of learners belonging to a different race; and (5) teachers’ malicious neglect of their in loco parentis responsibilities. Looking at teacher-on-learner violence through the lens of Galtung’s theory of violence, this study facilitates an understanding of the multi-layered and complex nature of teacher-on-learner violence and contributes to the existing body of knowledge on teacher-on-learner violence.

Post-COVID Teaching and Learning of Religious Education in the Context of School Violence in South Africa

Informed by the Bricolage theory, the authors sought to interrogate the role of religious education in combating school violence in South Africa in the post-pandemic era. While COVID, in many arguments, has been seen as catastrophic to humankind, it has evoked a religious sense among people to enable them to confront vulnerability, which can be harnessed to mitigate school violence. Located in participatory action research, a qualitative approach was used to collect data from twelve participants within the Free State province, where purposive sampling was used. The authors responded to two questions: What are the instigators of school violence? How can religious studies mitigate school violence in South African schools? The paper found that while religious education is underplayed in the South African curriculum, it has an impetus to ignite morality among teachers and learners to address school violence. Based on the paper’s findings, the article argues that despite its shortfalls, religious education remains one of the pillars of enacting the missing ingredient of morality which has made schools unsafe havens for educational stakeholders. In light of this argument, the article recommends reconsidering religious education as a core subject in South Africa from a borderless curriculum angle. Keywords: Bricolage, Religious Studies, School violence, Morality, COVID-19, Sustainable learning and borderless curriculum

Strategies to Prevent Leaner-on-Educator Violence in South African Schools

School violence is singled out by many researchers as an area of salient concern, both nationally and internationally. Moreover, learner-on-educator violence has become a phenomenon of great concern in schools worldwide; and no school is ruled out of this challenge. Various studies in the field of school violence focus on the safety of learners at schools, with inadequate attention paid to violence perpetrated against educators in school environments. Although some local studies on school-related violence do focus on educator-on-learner violence and the causes thereof, little or no studies have been conducted on coping strategies to deal with this concern. This literature study focused on learner-on-educator violence in South African schools and the coping strategies that educators use or can use to manage and restrict violence perpetrated against them. Located in the constructivist research paradigm, this study emanated from an empirical study by the authors on how educators, as victims of school violence, experience and understand learner-on-educator violence in the school environment. The findings of the current study revealed that South African educators use different coping strategies such as departmental directives; collegial support; in-school training programmes; monitoring of classroom access; collaboration with the school environment and participation of parents. It is concluded that these strategies are pertinent in stimulating the reduction of learner-on-educator violence in South African schools.

Teacher-instigated in-school interpersonal violence: Types and prevalence in South African public schools

The study examined types and prevalence of interpersonal violence in South African schools. Data on in-school interpersonal violence by the South African Council of Teachers (SACE) were analysed. The sample consisted of 1 184 teachers (rural = 32.6%, urban = 59.8%, peri-urban = 7.6%). Following logistic regression analyses, results indicated male teachers were the majority offenders. Furthermore, results showed that female teachers and learners were over nine times more likely to be victims of all types of violence, as compared to males. Findings support a social role theory perspective of gendered aggression in which males are likely to resort to physical violence, while females may engage in verbal violence.

Managing bullying in South African secondary schools: a case study

PurposeThe high prevalence of bullying in South African schools in recent times is a cause for serious concern. Bullying is traumatic and has a painful, corrosive and damaging impact on children, families and society. Hence, curbing the problem before it spirals out of control in secondary schools requires immediate urgent attention from all stakeholders of the school. The purpose of this paper is to report on part of the investigation done for a doctoral thesis (Singh, 2016), which looked at the factors contributing to bullying perpetration in secondary schools and on the basis of the findings, recommend a model that may be used to curb bullying in secondary schools. A qualitative research design was used to investigate the problem through an interview process with participants from secondary schools, as well as a circuit manager from the Uthungulu district of KwaZulu-Natal. The findings confirmed that the problem of bullying emanated at the level of the family, the school and the community. The paper concludes with the provision of a model to manage and curb bullying in these secondary schools.Design/methodology/approachA qualitative research approach, in particular a case study design, was selected to give a clear understanding of participants’ views and experiences (Johnson and Christensen, 2011; Mason, 2013). The design involved a social constructivist paradigm, which was primarily concerned with meaning and understanding people’s “lived experiences” and “inner-worlds” in the context of the conditions and circumstances of their lives, which in this particular instance was bullying in secondary schools, occurring within a social context, which was the school (Johnson and Christensen, 2011). Purposeful sampling was used to identify five secondary schools in the Uthungulu district of KwaZulu-Natal where the problem of bullying was most prevalent principals at circuit and district-level meetings complained about the high incidence of bullying perpetration in their schools.FindingsThis paper highlights the findings in respect of the factors contributing to bullying perpetration in schools and presents a management model to curb bullying in secondary schools in KwaZulu-Natal. Factors contributing to bullying: the findings from the empirical investigation avowed that the three key factors contributing significantly to bullying behaviour are located at the level of the family, the school and the community. First, influence at family level: “60–70 per cent of our learners come from broken homes”. An overwhelming majority of participants in all five secondary schools attributed the escalation of bullying in schools directly to the influence at the family level. Broken homes, poor upbringing, the absence of positive role models and the influence of media violence on learners have had a negative impact on the culture of discipline, teaching and learning in the classroom and the general ethos of schools. Second, influence at school level: “the foremost problem here is peer pressure”. An overwhelming number of participants identified several factors at the school level that contributed to bullying in secondary schools. Learner 3 (School A) highlighted the problem of peer pressure and the need to belong to a group as a critical factor in advancing bullying in schools. Third, influence at community level: “they come from that violent environment”. Participants explained that the absence of after-school programmes and a lack of facilities, particularly in rural communities, misdirected youngsters into engaging in other destructive vices such as forming gangs and indulging in drugs and alcohol, to keep themselves occupied.Originality/valueVarious studies have been conducted in South Africa to understand the phenomenon of bullying and violence in South African schools. While the current body of research highlights the problem of bullying in schools and provides some guidelines on what measures may be adopted to address the problem, the suggested methods are not effective enough, resulting in the problem continuing unabated. This study therefore suggests a model to manage and curb bullying in secondary schools in South Africa.

Engaging critical emancipatory research as an alternative to mitigate school violence in South Africa

In this theoretical paper, we contribute to ongoing narratives that attempt to mitigate and curb school violence. We do this by critiquing school relations through the lens of critical emancipatory research. Critical emancipatory research has the impetus to map skewed relations that exacerbate school violence in South African schools. In order to achieve our aim, we highlight various principles of critical emancipatory research that position the theory so that it relates to rebuilding school safety to achieve better schools for all stakeholders. The principles of social justice and social transformation, and the necessity to eliminate false consciousness, are discussed as critical elements of mitigating school violence. The article argues that critical emancipatory research, when it is used to frame relationships within the school milieu, has the impetus to forge new dimensions of, and responses to, conflict resolution-and to lessen school violence.

Teacher and learners’ belief in a just world and perspectives of discipline of Grade 4 - 8 learners in South African schools

In the present study, we examine the personal belief in a just world (PBJW) for teachers and learners in predominantly Afrikaans-speaking South African schools, and the relationship between teachers’ PBJW and their perception of problem behaviour in the classroom. The study is informed by national debates of school violence in South African schools, and international debates on zero-tolerance policies to address school violence. Our findings suggest that teachers’ PBJW predicts their perception of problem behaviour in classroom behaviour in four areas, namely challenging authority, disrespecting rules and authority and teacher negativity. Teachers with a strong PBJW were more likely to view classroom behaviours as problematic. Children generally reported that their teachers were fair and just and liked them. However, boys were more likely to have experienced trouble with their teachers and to view them as unfair and unjust. We discuss the significance of the findings in terms of school violence and also mention gendered interpretations to school violence.

A nonviolent pedagogical approach for Life Orientation teacher development: the Alternatives to Violence Project

Violence in South African schools seems to be increasing and the consequences affect not only the physical, emotional, and academic lives of learners but also their resistance to delinquent and criminal behaviour. Because the foundations for youth violence are laid in early adolescence, violence prevention in schools is a critical need. Life orientation (LO) as a compulsory school subject could play a key role in helping South African learners deal with the different manifestations of violence, especially understanding the nature of the institutionalised violence of colonialism and apartheid. LO can also nurture learners' personal development and life skills to increase their sense of agency, a key factor in both violence prevention and learners' decolonisation processes. However, various South African studies attest to the current low status of LO in the school curriculum as well as the difficulties of teaching LO. Many of these studies also mention the inadequacy of LO teachers' preparation for meaningful LO teaching. Given that equipping current-day South African learners with the self-empowerment skills necessary for preventing everyday conflicts from escalating into violence also entails this complex decolonisation process to liberate them of past or still present oppressions, this paper contends that LO teachers need to have first participated in such self-development processes themselves. For these reasons, this article proposes a specific development strategy to support LO teachers, namely, that they participate in workshops of the Alternatives to Violence Project (AVP),1 which applies a nonviolent pedagogical approach in its focus on self-empowerment and creative conflict management. The article discusses the benefits of such an approach and conceptually explores how AVP has the potential to provide LO teachers with practical strategies for creative, affirming responses to conflict and violence.

An Exploratory Study on How Democratic School Management Practices Affect the Dynamics of Violence in Schools

The goal of teachers, schools and support staff is the optimal development of learners. This goal depends on effective school management, which in turn depends on an adequate curriculum and supporting teaching and learning environments. This paper is focused through a literature review on the dynamics of violence in South African schools and the need for democratic school management. The necessity of emotional intelligence teaching in the classroom and learner-centred teaching is shown. This study also investigated the coordinated and integrated management of positive learner behaviour, whole school development and management of a culture of positive behaviour. The establishment of a safe school depends on the management's interaction with the larger social and organisational context in which they find themselves. The study concludes that there is a correlation between Emotional Intelligence teaching methods and learners' behaviour. The use of Emotional Intelligence in the classroom can be regarded as the corrective aspect of discipline, thus, preventing inappropriate behaviour of learners. Recommendations and guidelines for the use of effective adjusted and alternative teaching methods to support school management in the use of emotional skills in the school context are provided.

Learning to fear, fearing to learn: Measuring the extent of school violence

Violence in South African schools impacts on children, their families, and society more generally. Much of what occurs in schools is learnt through exposure to violence at home and outside the school, necessitating an integrated approach to addressing school violence that moves beyond a limited focus on the school itself. The Centre for Justice and Crime Prevention National Schools Violence Study provides an indication of how bad school violence is in South Africa, and through the wide range of data collected, provides a framework for interventions that cuts across sectors and conventional school-based stakeholders.

Homophobic violence in a Northern Cape school: Learners confront the issue

abstract Violence has become synonymous with South African schooling. A burgeoning body of literature points to homophobia as a source of such violence. Research conducted by social justice research institutes and international non-governmental organisations (NGOs) found that homophobic violence undermines young people’s inherent right to human dignity, and has devastating psychosocial effects. Efforts to combat school-based violence more generally, and homophobic violence in particular, have to a larger extent been insufficient and ineffective. This briefing reflects on learner voices on how to combat the problem of homophobic violence in South African schools. Data was gathered through observation, informal recorded face-to-face interviews and focused group discussions with male learners (between the ages of 17 – 19 years). Themes such as: ‘the extent of homophobic violence’ and ‘what could be done to deal with violence in the school context’ were explored. The research found that homophobic violence is pervasive, and that boys experience routine discrimination on the grounds of their sexual identity. Learners proposed multipronged interventions, focussing on families, schools, and communities at large. These interventions are aimed at promoting a culture of tolerance and respect in and outside the school context.

Interrupting school violence with deliberative encounters

ABSTRACTViolence is an enveloping experience in South African schools. The article seeks to focus attention and extend the understanding of this crucial contemporary problem. This article reviews, from published statistics, the experience of school violence in South Africa. Levels of violence in South African schools, according to statistics gathered in a National School Violence Study (NSVS) by the Centre for Justice and Crime Prevention (CJCP), are high. An inquiry is thus made as to how school violence may be interrupted. The article asserts that authoritarianism characterised by giving and taking orders, is a major contributor to violence at school. Deliberative democracy, where reason giving is an imperative is argued to be a potential antithesis to authoritarianism. As such the article proposes that increasing deliberative encounters – interactions that promote the process of reason-giving – in the classroom would contribute to interrupting violence in schools.

Violence in South African Schools: Perceptions of Communities about a Persistent Problem

Multiple incidents of violence in South African schools have elevated the issue to being a national concern. The aim of this article is to report on an investigation into the perception of school communities regarding conditions that make violence such a persistent problem in schools. Located within the critical emancipatory research (CER) paradigm, the article emanates from a larger community engagement project, which is a sequel to a study on the dynamics of violence in schools conducted in 2011*. Qualitative data were collected in 2013 through a series of focus group discussions involving 698 participants in two provinces. Preliminary findings reveal that weak leadership, ineffective or dysfunctional governance and management structures, poor parental participation, lack of teacher professionalism and an overall lack of accountability militate against successful implementation of intervention strategies. It is then suggested that mobilising communities, empowering and equipping them with relevant knowledge and skills is likely stimulate appropriate action towards the reduction of violence in schools. DOI: 10.5901/mjss.2014.v5n14p198

Gang-related Violence in South African Schools

This paper reports on a primarily qualitative study which also employed some quantitative research methods in collecting data in six provinces in South Africa. In order to get at the lived reality of gang-related violence in schools, qualitative research was used and to get an overall picture of gang-related violence in South African schools, quantitative research was also used. Data was collected from a range of members of the school governing bodies namely learners, parents, teachers and non-teaching staff. The results confirm the enormity of gang-related violence in schools. Findings showed that the fear of gang-related violence at school can be as harmful as primary victimisation and personal experiences of violence, causing learners to drop out or avoid school, or to lose concentration in the classroom and in learners developing healthy pro-social relationships as actual victimisation. It was also found gang violence is a destructive phenomenon and has a negative effect on the delivery of quality of education. The study is concluded with recommendations extracted from relevant literature as well as comments expressed by the participants of this study. Through collective ownership, responsibility and self-reliance, communities can succeed in reducing the incidence and prevalence of violence within their community. A standardised code of conduct and school safety policy are vital tools in the prevention and management of school-based violence, but should be adjusted to meet the school’s specific needs regarding violence and discipline. Schools should have access to effective psychological support to counter the effects of violence and to foster and reinforce effective coping strategies. Whilst this study intends to improve our understanding of school-related violence and fill some of the gaps identified by previous studies, it is clear that further research is needed.

The Hybrid Nature of School Space and the Manifestation of Violence in South African Schools

Violence in South African schools seems to challenge the conventional perception of school as a safe place. Drawing from the qualitative data of a project that investigated the dynamics of violence in South African schools, this paper illustrates the manner in which violent practices in schools speak to the hybrid nature of school space. Using theories of hybridity and Third Space, the authors argue that as researchers and educators advocate for students to brings funds of knowledge they learn from outside school to develop a Third Space for learning, they overlook the effects of violence as part of those funds of knowledge. The paper concludes by posing a challenge to educators and researchers that, while useful knowledge from outside school is necessary for holistic learning, adequate preparation is needed for addressing the unwanted funds of knowledge.

The Hybrid Nature of School Space and the Manifestation of Violence in South African Schools

Violence in South African schools seems to challenge the conventional perception of school as a safe place. Drawing from the qualitative data of a project that investigated the dynamics of violence in South African schools, this paper illustrates the manner in which violent practices in schools speak to the hybrid nature of school space. Using theories of hybridity and Third Space, the authors argue that as researchers and educators advocate for students to brings funds of knowledge they learn from outside school to develop a Third Space for learning, they overlook the effects of violence as part of those funds of knowledge. The paper concludes by posing a challenge to educators and researchers that, while useful knowledge from outside school is necessary for holistic learning, adequate preparation is needed for addressing the unwanted funds of knowledge.

Violence in South African Schools: What Is External and what is Internal to Schools?

This article reports on a qualitative study that used interviews, participant observations and documents. A questionnaire was also employed. The study, which was conducted in six provinces of South Africa, explored the perceptions and experiences of school stakeholders of school violence, the nature of violence that takes place in South African schools and measures and initiatives taken by schools to promote a violence-free environment. Even though not all schools are violent, the findings suggest that violence is a serious problem in South African schools,. Some teachers are verbally, physically and psychologically violent towards learners, and frequently resort to using corporal punishment, which is illegal. The question is asked whether increased control, surveillance and punishment of learners (and staff) or better managed and organised schools is the best way to help to reduce violence. If an emphasis on the latter is to be the way forward, then this has significant implications for the recruitment, training and leadership performance of principals and for their ability to ensure more effective schools through better teacher punctuality and attendance. DOI: 10.5901/mjss.2014.v5n3p324

Preventing Violence in South African schools: Control and Punish or more Effective School Management?

The paper is based on a qualitative study conducted in South African schools to obtain insights and understanding of the how and why of violence in schools based on the perceptions and experiences of teachers, learners, principals, support staff and School Governing Bodies (SGBs). Semi-structured interviews, focus group interviews and observations were conducted to collect data. The study also employed ‘quantitative’ research methodology so questionnaires were administered across six provinces in South Africa. The study reveals that many teachers are verbally, physically (use corporal punishment) and psychologically violent towards learners. Lack of professionalism, teacher absenteeism and non-punctuality contribute to violence. There is evidence in the report of some schools’ failure to take into account the individual needs of young people by trying to control them in a generic manner resulting in violent rebelliousness. There is evidence in the report that many schools are not managed well. It emerged that because of authoritarianism, schools are failing to protect learners from violence. Thus, policy makers and educationalists will have to change ways of reducing violence in schools from those that emphasise punishment, control and surveillance of learners to employing strategies that eliminate authoritarianism and increase effective school organisation and culture. DOI: 10.5901/mjss.2014.v5n3p416