Self-defense classes for teachers not off the table- GTU General Secretary

With the level of violence in school seemingly on the increase and with teachers being on the receiving end of abuse and violence from both parents and in some instances students, having self-defense classes for teachers is not an option that is not being considered.

During an exclusive interview with BIG Smith News Watch’s Kimberly Giddings on Friday, General Secretary of the Guyana Teachers Union Coretta McDonald MP. Said the violence against teachers in school is moving to another level and remains unactable.

“I mean it’s not a nice thing to say but I think I have to say it, teachers have got to start being able to represent themselves, maybe we might have to start having some training classes to teach teachers how to do self-defense because we cannot continue to allow these kinds of things to happen” the GTU General Secretary McDonald told Kimberly Giddings during the interview.

McDonald said at the moment, there are two teachers within the system who have permanent scars inflicted by the hands of parents of children attending school.

“I can tell you that we have two teachers one at St. Agnes [Primary School], well she is no longer at St. Agnes and one at Winfer Gardens who have scars on their faces that they will have to live with for the rest of their lives, they got that from parents,” McDonald said in referring to previous violent encounters between teachers and parents.

McDonald who started her teaching career at the age of 14, said violence in schools is something that has long been a sore issue, and it’s time to take the bull by the horn.

“Assault on parents is not a new thing but the intensity of it has grown and it is now even more, I don’t want to say dangerous, but it has gone to another level where violence is the thing of the day. Assaulting teachers is totally wrong, we have zero tolerance for that, I have zero tolerance for that” The Union’s GS firmly stated.

Coretta McDonald during her interview explained that when teachers have to encounter violent parents, the children are the ones who suffer the most and many parents do not take the time to pay attention to that aspect of things.

“Your child suffers in the long run because every teacher depending on the level that, that child is at, every teacher will now be walking on thin ice when they have to deal with your child because they know oh, ‘you see this mother, [um um] she like to buse and she likes to fight’ so that child now… unless the child is a child who can go out there and work on their own without much assistance, that child in many instances would be left to fend for himself or herself. If you finish the work you finish the work, if you ain’t finish the work too bad for you, if you could read…. and so here it is, we are creating many more problems in our society and we have got to fix it and we have to return to the point where we return to the drawing table and fix the problem.” Corretta McDonald said as she addressed school violence.

Over the last few days, there have been instances of violence in Georgetown Schools where parents have been attacking teachers.