Province strives for safe and caring schools

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On Nov. 25 to 27, a conference called Safe and Caring Schools was held in Edmonton. More than 1,100 people attended the three-day event that featured more than 90 speakers who addressed such topics as violence prevention, bullying, suspensions, expulsions and human rights.

"I think that we had nine provinces and the territories represented with delegates. We even had one or two delegates from the United States. It was nice to see representation from all across the country," said Dr. Vicki Mather, director of the Alberta Teachers Association's Safe and Caring School project.

"The conference was all about building safer and more caring schools in communities, looking at preventing violence, looking at the causes of violence and developing pro-active responses rather than reacting to violence," she said.

A 1993 study in Ontario found that 80 per cent of the students there claimed they had been victimized by other students. The forms of victimization that were reported were fights, bullying, punching, hitting, grabbing, verbal threats, damage to property and theft.

Canadian studies found that one in 12 children is regularly harassed in schools by other students, one in five is bullied, and more than one in seven students claimed they had been bullied other students.

A study on Calgary's junior and senior high school students indicated that 37 per cent of the students there reported they had been slapped and kicked by other students and 42 per cent claimed they received threats from fellow students.

In 1996 in an Alberta Teachers Association survey, 56 per cent of teachers reported an increase in classroom disruptive behavior. The largest increase was reported by elementary school teachers. The report also claimed that violence was a learned behavior; that children were getting their education on violence from the television programs they watched. By the time a child reaches the age of 12, they've already seen more than 8,000 murders and 100,000 other acts of violence on television.

"Kids are under a lot of stress. There is lot of pressure put on them as a result of advertising and the entertainment media, all of which seems to promote sex and violence," said Mather. "That is not conducive to growing up and forming respectful relationships. We also live in a society that is very, very busy. Kids have less time one on one with caring adults than they did in the past. On the basis of the research that was done by the Alberta Teachers Association a few years ago called Trying to Teach, teachers told us then that kids were becoming less respectful, that it seemed to be permeating society," said Mather. "As a result it is now in our schools. There is just less respect shown and an increase in problem behaviors. I think less respect means that it starts with less respect for one's self. We have to build on kids self- esteem before they can learn to respect others," she said.

The Safe and Caring Schools Project began in 1996 as a comprehensive violence prevention and character education endeavor designed to encourage socially responsible and respectful behavior.

"The whole safe and caring schools initiative started with funding from the Alberta government, what was then Alberta education. The Alberta Teachers Association was invited to apply for a grant to develop resources for parents, teachers and students," said Mather. "We did that and we started our safe and caring schools project and applied to other sources for funding. With that funding we developed numerous resources for schools in communities. We've developed a number of workshops for adults and parents in communities to help them model and reinforce the behavior of teaching in schools. We've also developed workshops for teachers and other people who work in schools. These guides are available for any one who requests them off of us, " Mather said.