SADTU STATEMENT ON THE GLENVISTA SECONDARY SCHOOL CLASSROOM FIGHT
06 May 2024
The South African Democratic Teachers’ Union (SADTU) demands justice and fairness in dealing with the fight between learners and a teacher at Glenvista High School.
Even though the video of the fight is attracting comments from the public, SADTU expects that every person involved should be treated fairly and let the innocent until proven guilty rule prevail because we do not know the context.
Schools are meant to be safe spaces, but this incident proves otherwise. Sadly, such incidents are becoming a common occurrence.
We understand the Gauteng Department of Education today brought to the school psychosocial services to counsel the learners and not the teachers. The Department must provide psychosocial counselling to all the teachers because they have been affected by the attack on their colleague. Just like the learners, teachers have rights and deserve fair treatment from the employer, the Gauteng Department of Education. The teacher did not report for duty today and there is no indication that the Department followed-up on his condition.
It is unfortunate that the law and the South African Council for Educators (SACE) have prescribed sanctions for teachers who engage in physical confrontation with the learners, but these do not exist for the learners.
Further, we call on all stakeholders in education to do their part in ensuring that schools are safe as part of SADTU’s “I am A School Fan” campaign. Learners should be in class, prepared and disciplined; parents should ensure they always instil discipline and values on their children, and teachers should be punctual, prepared and teach.
We urge the Department of Education to speed up the investigation into this matter. While we await the investigation processes, we urge the department to create a conducive environment for the teachers to work and apply the rules for dealing with unruly and aggressive behaviour.
We condemn attacks on teachers because they will deter people from choosing teaching as a career and therefore deny the country of enthusiastic student teachers.
ISSUED BY: SADTU Secretariat