The incidence of physical assaults on teachers by their students is on the rise across the country.
It is a trend which calls for a national conversation and action lest it destroys the fabric of learning in the school system.
The statistics of the incidence of the aberration is growing by the day. For now, the aberrations only make media headlines without accompanying redressing action from stakeholders.
Until recently, perhaps with the advent of smart phones and the Gen Z age, such incidents were isolated, even unheard of.
Today, the internet is awash with reported cases of students beating up not only teachers, but security guards employed to ensure their safety on school campuses.
Even more worrying is how inter-school games intended to build bonds and encourage the spirit of sportsmanship among students as they prepare for post-school life have become scenes of bloodshed.
The most recent incident of such indiscipline is the one played out where some students of Swedru School of Business assaulted a student of Obrachire Senior High Technical School (SHTS) and pelted him with stones, leading to his hospitalisation.
Just what accounted for this physical assault which could have claimed the life of the victim of the attack is something the authorities should find out. Could the attackers at that age be on drugs or being driven by sheer youthful and reckless exuberance?
If we thought that boarding houses are the safest for our kids, let us revise our positions and join in finding a better way of ridding the school system of this social ailment now bordering on criminalities.
At Berekum Senior High School (SHS), students in the boarding house who sought to leave the location for an undisclosed mission in the night but were prevented from doing so, vented their frustration on the night security guard. They beat him to unconsciousness.
To think that these days such students are in their mid-teens makes it even more disturbing.
A few weeks ago, a concerned Nima group descended upon truant students from the sprawling Accra suburb at a hideout where they pitch camp instead of being at school.
School authorities should consider instilling discipline through acceptable dressing code among other measures. Students who do not dress properly should not be allowed in the classroom. Many students these days hardly tuck in their shirts, dressing themselves so shabbily one wonders whether they are really heading for school or even leaving an environment of learning and where discipline is instilled in students.
The Kade SHTS is part of the unenviable list of schools with teacher-beating students. Here, some students were captured on video physically assaulting a man employed to teach them. His offence: he was strict with examination regulations.
At the West Africa SHS in Accra, students reportedly assaulted a teacher because he did not close his eyes to their breach of school regulations.
Christian Methodist SHS in Accra is part of the list. Here, students beat up a teacher because he too stepped in when school regulations were being breached. The Ghana National Association of Teachers (GNAT) issued a statement which did not result in any situation-changing aftermath.
At Akro SHTS, students assaulted a teacher and stabbed a security guard with a broken bottle.
Education authorities have warned that disciplinary action would be taken against students who engage in acts of indiscipline, but that ends it.
Not acting to stem indiscipline in the school system could compromise the academic ambience in these centres of learning and turn them into breeding grounds for tomorrow’s criminals.
