Violence and discipline breakdown in Guyana’s schools

Nov 04, 2015 Letters

---

Dear Editor,
The anticipated crackdown by the Trinidad and Tobago Police Administration to stamp out gangland crime echoes our concern for the breakdown in discipline and the reported increase in violence in Guyana particularly in our schools.  This concern is no more obvious than in the Education Ministry’s plan to increase the number of counselors into the school system.
Let’s face the inconvenient truth that gangs and gang-related crime exist in our society.  I can see no acceptable reason to contradict the statistical and anecdotal evidence.
The issue is how we deal with the problem in our schools.  The concern expressed by the MoE is indicative of its recognition that it has an obligation to provide a safe space for all who operate within the school environment including the teaching and auxiliary staff, and the student body.
However, this responsibility does not reside in a vacuum since it is the responsibility of any community or institution with a potential gang problem to develop a continuum of prospective prevention, intervention, and before the problem is discovered, suppression strategies.  In so doing it may be possible to interrupt the gangs’ progression from involvement in general delinquency and property crimes to involvement in serious, violent activities.
It is in that regard that we do not lose sight of the role that our communities can play in the positive development of the young mind.  Communities can provide support through volunteerism where volunteers staff appropriate programmes in various capacities such as mentors, trainers, or coordinators, with support from the private sector for the program to be a success.  Advisory boards or resource groups could be sourced from within the academic community to offer ideas on training, services, and activities.
During 1998, the Epidemiology Research Unit, of the Tropical Medicine Research Institute, University of the West Indies conducted a study on the perceptions and experiences of violence among secondary school students in Kingston, Jamaica, and its environs.
The areas surveyed were: fights and safety at school; threats and attacks on teachers; threats and attacks on students; neighborhood violence; experience of violence outside of school; attributed causes of fights; and influence of the media. Among the several factors analyzed were perceptions of acceptable behaviour; experiences and perceptions of violence; and concern about violence.
In March 2010, the Ministry of Education reintroduced the National Voluntary Mentoring Programmeaimed at “inculcating acceptable behaviours in students, promoting tolerance, and addressing some of the challenges facing the education system, including violence and students’ low academic performance as part of its effort to address the problem of indiscipline in schools.”
The point is that in addition to counseling, mentoring has proven to be an effective delinquency prevention strategy which can mean the difference between dropping out of school and graduating, or between getting involved with drugs and criminal gangs and developing the strength and self-confidence to resist such pressures.
Editor, let us take the not unusual scenario of young persons who may have lost a parent(s), or who are experiencing neglect or abuse or who may be lonely or uncomfortable in certain social situations.  This vulnerable category of persons may especially benefit from the support, attention, and kindness of a mentor who comes equipped with special skills and other institutional supports.
Under certain circumstances a peer mentorship model has proven effective where older youth are matched with young students in a one-on-one relationship acting as role models providing guidance and support to face challenges associated with schoolwork; social issues, such as pressure to drink, smoke, or use drugs; family problems or tension; and other typical difficulties of growing up; and even to hangout or enjoy a lime.
The model provides the important extra support that many younger people need to make it through a difficult period in their lives — when peer pressure and the desire to fit in are strong influences. A carefully designed and well run programme has the potential to provide positive influences for young people who may not have a good support system available to them in the first instance.
The conclusion of a research project in the early 1990s by Dr. Irving Spergel at the University of Chicago resulted in the development of the Spergel Model of Gang Intervention and Suppression whose principal focus was on social disorganization theory.  Renamed the Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention (OJJDP) Comprehensive Gang Model, it was was based on best practices to address gang-related violence and crime as implemented in a number of communities around the country. Later Spergel and Curry (1993) drawing from responses from law enforcement and other agency personnel in 65 cities reporting problems with gangs, identified five core strategies to address gang youth, their families, and the community institutions that would promote youths’ transition from adolescence to productive members of society.  The strategies included community mobilization, social intervention, provision of opportunities, organizational change and development, and suppression.
Briefly: Community Mobilization requires the involvement of local citizens, including former gang-involved youth, community groups, agencies, and coordination of programs and staff functions within and across sectors and agencies. Opportunities Provision refers to development of a variety of specific education, training, and employment programs targeting gang-involved youth; Social Intervention involving youth-serving agencies, schools, grassroots groups, faith-based organizations, police, and other juvenile/criminal justice organizations in “reaching out” to gang-involved youth and their families, and linking them with the conventional world and needed services; Suppression introduces formal and informal social control procedures, including close supervision and monitoring of gang-involved youth by agencies of the juvenile/criminal justice system and also by community-based agencies, schools, and grassroots groups; and Organizational Change and Development includes the development and implementation of policies and procedures that result in the most effective use of available and potential resources, within and across agencies, to better address the gang problem. An evaluation of the implemented OJJDP Model came up with several positive results: serious violent and property crimes were reduced, gang involvement of older gang members decreased, gang members participated successfully in educational and employment endeavors, and violent crime and drug arrests for the target group were reduced.
In 2003, OJJDP launched the Gang Reduction Program (GRP) to reduce gang activity in targeted neighborhoods in four cities.  The program integrates prevention, intervention, suppression, and reentry activities and uses existing community resources to sustain itself. In addition to reducing gang violence, the goal of GRP was to determine the necessary practices to create a community environment that helps reduce youth gang crime and violence in targeted neighborhoods. The GRP focused on two goals: (1) to learn the key ingredients for success and (2) to reduce youth gang delinquency, crime, and violence by helping communities take an integrated approach which features: Primary prevention targeting the entire population in high-crime and high-risk communities.  The key component is a One-Stop Resource Center that is accessible and visible to members of the community and provides services including prenatal and infant care, afterschool activities, truancy and dropout prevention, and job programs; Secondary prevention which identifies young children (ages 7–14) at high risk and – drawing on the resources of schools, community-based organizations, and faith-based groups—intervenes with appropriate services before early problem behaviors turn into serious delinquency and gang involvement; Intervention targeting active gang members and close associates, and involves aggressive outreach and recruitment activity. Support services for gang-involved youth and their families help youth make positive choices; Suppression focuses on identifying the most dangerous and influential gang members and removing them from the community; and Reentry targeting serious offenders who are returning to the community after confinement and provides appropriate services and monitoring.
Editor, having regard to all of the above for any programme to be sustainable and effective in reducing gang problems, partnerships must be developed and managed with a broad understanding of all localised risk factors across domains. Special attention should be paid to gang members who -in their quest to reassert their former gang roles, may be inclined to sabotage programmes and disrupt lives though subversion of those susceptible and vulnerable youth.
Patrick Mentore

---

---