Category Archives: NZ Media

Broadcaster ‘disgusted’ with school after bullying

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Broadcaster ‘disgusted’ with

school after bullying

4:00AM Saturday Dec 20, 2008
By Vaimoana Tapaleao

Kate Hawkesby says deciding to remove her sons from Victoria Avenue School was a no-brainer. Photo / Supplied

Kate Hawkesby says deciding to remove her sons from Victoria Avenue School was a no-brainer. Photo / Supplied

Broadcaster Kate Hawkesby has pulled her two children out of their Remuera primary school after its handling of a case of bullying.

A Ministry of Education inquiry is underway after a 10-year-old child was bullied at Victoria Avenue School in Auckland.

An independent report commissioned by the school’s board of trustees said the school’s handling of the case was “so badly flawed and biased that it has revictimised the complainant child”.

Hawkesby, who reads the news on Auckland’s radio station NewstalkZB and yesterday read out the report about the school, is among parents who say the lack of quality leadership and intimidation has led to the “downslide” of the school.

The former TVNZ Breakfast co-host said the case had contributed to her decision to remove her children from the school – but there were other factors as well.

“I’m absolutely disgusted. They [head staff] were very ineffectual in dealing with us [parents] and they didn’t seem interested in what we had to say or enforcing the necessary punishment to the perpetrator.”

In the incident in question, a child was pushed up against a wall and “humped” (simulated sex).

Hawkesby said one of her sons had also been bullied – in a completely different way – and she had been unimpressed with the school’s handling of the case.

Taking him and his brother out of the school was a no-brainer, she said.

“No mother wants to have their kid go through that.

“You’ll do anything for your kids. I think the reason I took it so far [to the Ministry of Education] was because many parents had gone through the same situation – [head staff] just did not care.

“There was a culture there that was pretty rife. It wasn’t the staff, but the leadership at the school.”

Another mother, who wanted to remain anonymous, said she initially sent her children to the school because of its high reputation and fond memories that she had had of the school where she was a pupil years before.

But “appalling treatment” of parents and students had led to her regretting the decision, she said.

“Very manipulative and intimidating. It’s terrifying for parents. My son was accused of being a bully. He was basically screamed and shouted at and told that he was lying – they later found that it wasn’t true,” the mother said.

The school did not return calls from the Weekend Herald yesterday.

The ministry has said it has been assured the school is developing a plan to follow up on the report.

Hardcore truants by the thousand

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Hardcore truants by the thousand

By LANE NICHOLS – The Dominion Post | Saturday, 20 December 2008

Thousands of the most at-risk children are still missing from classrooms, forcing education officials to act as detectives hunting long-term truants.

Principal Youth Court Judge Andrew Becroft said the “unexploded time bombs” who were mainly male represented the hardcore youth offenders. It was unacceptable that so many had fallen out of the schooling system.

“They’re our toughest kids with a constellation of problems. As Youth Court judges, we’re terribly concerned by the lack of engagement in education of these top-end offenders.”

A year after The Dominion Post revealed a “lost tribe” of nearly 7000 children not enrolled at any school, the Education Ministry admits more than 2500 are still missing “on any given day”.

About 450 have not been to school in more than six months 148 of them in more than a year. Most are junior high school pupils.

Education Minister Anne Tolley has ordered an urgent briefing from officials and warned yesterday that parents who failed to enrol their children were jeopardising their futures and committing a serious offence.

Ministry senior manager Jim Greening said numbers had dropped significantly in the past year but the situation remained unsatisfactory. Pupils who dropped out of the school system were at risk of spiralling into trouble later in life, he said, potentially costing society millions of dollars through crime and their drain on health and social services.

“We’ve got people across the country working very hard on this issue. We want to give all these kids every chance we can.”

All the missing kids are aged under 16 so are legally required to attend class but have been absent for at least 20 days.

Mr Greening said the hardcore truants were revealed by a computer enrolment tracking system in all schools since August last year. More than 30 staff were employed nationally to find the truants.

Of the nearly 7000 cases identified last year, many of the most-difficult pupils had been hunted down and re-enrolled.

An information-sharing agreement with the Immigration Service showed thousands of others had left the country, or were on the list only because of processing errors. But many hundreds more were missing.

“Often they don’t have any address,” Mr Greening said. “[Officials] go to the place where the family was. If they’re not there, they’ll ask neighbours. It becomes a detective thing, I guess.”

The missing children often came from dysfunctional families with complex problems. Ministry officials sometimes alerted other agencies such as police and Child, Youth and Family. “The really long-term hard ones, our people might locate. But we know in three months’ time our people are going to be looking for them again because they won’t be in class.”

Judge Becroft said Youth Court judges had always suspected a group of up to 3000 pupils had fallen out of the education system, but the ministry had only now been able to quantify it.

Children’s Commissioner Cindy Kiro said non-enrolled children were being denied their right to an education.

Bullying ‘second highest in world’

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Bullying ‘second highest in world’

By MARTIN KAY – The Dominion Post | Monday, 15 December 2008

Kiwi children have reported the second highest incidence of bullying in the world, according to a major international report.

But the primary school teachers’ union is urging caution over the findings, which show New Zealand second only to Taiwan when it comes to children saying they have been hit, teased, stolen from or picked on.

Educational Institute president Frances Nelson said New Zealand had a high-profile focus on bullying, meaning Kiwi children were more likely to disclose incidents.

The Trends In International Mathematics and Science Study, which covered the equivalent of Year 5 pupils in nearly 40 countries, including 5000 from New Zealand, found Kiwi children reported incidences of bullying behaviour at twice the international average.

One in three Kiwi children said they were the victim of at least three of five tests to gauge safety in schools.

These were that during the past month:

Something of theirs was stolen.

They were shoved, hit or kicked by other pupils.

They were made to do something they did not want to.

They were made fun of or called names.

They were left out of activities.

Answering yes to three of the questions placed children in the low safety category. Taiwan, with 35 per cent, had the worst record, followed by New Zealand (33 per cent), Qatar (31 per cent), Tunisia (28 per cent) and Kuwait (27 per cent).

New Zealand also had the second lowest proportion, 25 per cent, of children in the high-safety category – those answering no to all five questions. Only Tunisia was lower.

The research was in a 2007 study conducted by the Association for the Evaluation of Educational Achievement. It examined safety in schools to put maths and science achievement into a wider context.

It found New Zealand Year 5 pupils were doing worse in the subjects than more than half the other countries surveyed.

Miss Nelson said she was wary of reading too much into the safety findings though she stressed bullying was unacceptable.

“I do think that we need to be cautious about saying that we’re one of the highest bullying countries in the world, because I’m not sure that we are. I just think that we address it more regularly and kids are much more aware.

“I would strongly expect New Zealand children to report more frequently because they are encouraged to do so.”

Education Minister Anne Tolley said she wanted to see the report and the data it was based on. She did not think the previous government had done enough to deal with bullying, and planned to gather information from schools on what they were doing to spread best practice.

Labour education spokesman Chris Carter said the findings were a “shocking wake-up call” for the new government, and showed he had been right to boost anti-bullying resources for schools.

The move, which included check lists on how children could keep safe in schools, were criticised by Ms Tolley at the time. She said she stood by those criticisms.

A 15 Girl charged with intimidating teacher

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A 15 Girl charged with intimidating teacher

December 11, 2008, 8:16 am-year-old Taranaki girl, already in trouble for assaulting a teacher last week, has been charged with intimidation after allegedly confronting the woman twice at the weekend.

A police investigation into the school fracas last week has confirmed the girl assaulted the teacher after having non-regulation clothing confiscated.

The school, which said the student knocked the teacher to the ground and repeatedly punched her, has expelled the girl.

Senior Sergeant Matt Prendergast told the Taranaki Daily News the student had since stalked and intimidated the teacher.

Twice last weekend the middle-aged woman was allegedly surrounded by a predominantly female gang, including the girl, and abused.

Mr Prendergast said during both incidents, another girl was observed inches away from the teacher yelling obscenities at her.

The teacher’s car was also targeted and damaged, with mirrors smashed while she and her husband were shopping.

The girl has been bailed on two counts of intimidation and referred to Youth Aid. Others involved will also be dealt with by Youth Aid.

Mr Prendergast said pack mentality led to the “disgusting behaviour”.

“It’s uncalled for. Everybody’s tougher when they get into a pack,” he said.

Despite sustaining serious injuries in the original assault, the teacher had returned to work but was damaged by the events, her principal said.

“It’s just traumatic. This is her community, she and her whanau have lived here for many, many years,” the principal said.

Teacher struck off over sex notes to boy

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Teacher struck off over sex notes to boy

Friday, 12 December 2008

A teacher has been struck off after exchanging explicit sexual messages in a journal with a 13-year-old boy in her class.

The journal was discovered by other pupils in the class and the teacher resigned from the school after she was confronted by the principal, the New Zealand Herald reported.

The teacher has been formally censured by the Teachers’ Council disciplinary tribunal and struck off the register.

The boy penned a “crush note” to his intermediate school teacher, and they had an inappropriate written relationship lasting several weeks last year.

The student, the teacher and school were not publicly identified.

The teacher ran a journal system in her class, where students could communicate anything they wished, the tribunal heard.

The journal had exchanges between the pair, in which the teacher discussed touching the student, showing her g-string and commenting on the size of his penis.

The teacher resigned from the school, undertook counselling, apologised and pointed to her relative professional inexperience.

The teacher engaged in an “entirely inappropriate relationship with the Year 8 (13-year-old) student”, said tribunal chairman Kenneth Johnston.