What is going on in our schools?

THE EDITOR, Madam:

Allow me to use this medium to state how disgruntled I am with some of the students who are now attending schools. I have been following the news over the past few months and I’m surprised to see what has been happening with our children.

In September of this year we saw where a younger student from the B.B. Coke High School was brutally assaulted by an older student just because he reportedly stepped on his shoes. Can you imagine, over a simple thing like a shoe.

What happened to the morals we were taught where students could simply say I’m sorry and if needs be dust off the shoes and just move right along with their daily lives?

In October of this year we saw reports of another incident where a 13-year-old female student from the Steer Town Academy was badly beaten by an older female just because she also reportedly stepped on her shoes.

Media reports stated that the older student threatened the younger female that she would retaliate after school in which six older students reportedly attacked the victim, sending her to the St Ann’s Bay Hospital.

Just this week, I was watching the news and there was another incident in which a group of students were fighting in a St James-based high school, which resulted in one of the very teachers who are teaching them being assaulted. How can this be? The very teachers who are hired to teach are fearful because of the level of indiscipline being exhibited by the nation’s children.

In our society where children should be the future, I must say that if this is the generation of children that should be our future, it is in jeopardy.

The songs that these students listen to that promote violence, as well as the wrong principles and values that some of the parents of these children instil in them can cause them to react to situations the way they currently do.

I want to reinforce and encourage our students to understand that school is a place of learning and not a place of violence.

ABIGAIL WILLIAMS