RAD­HI­CA DE SIL­VA

Ed­u­ca­tion Min­is­ter Dr Nyan Gads­by-Dol­ly is ex­pect­ed to re­ceive a re­port to­day (Thurs­day) re­gard­ing a nine-year-old pupil who has been sus­pend­ed mul­ti­ple times for al­leged­ly ter­ror­iz­ing class­mates at a pri­ma­ry school in Fyz­abad.

The pupil at­tend­ed class­es yes­ter­day with­out in­ci­dent. On Tues­day, com­mu­ni­ty po­lice vis­it­ed the school and spoke to the child.

A source at the Pres­by­ter­ian Pri­ma­ry School Board of Ed­u­ca­tion told Guardian Me­dia that any ex­tend­ed sus­pen­sion would re­quire the min­istry’s ap­proval.

On Tues­day, the Min­is­ter said a child could be ex­pelled if the con­duct was se­vere enough.

How­ev­er, she added that warn­ing let­ters might be is­sued based on the guide­lines out­lined in the Na­tion­al Dis­ci­pline Ma­trix.

Mean­while, na­tion­al se­cu­ri­ty ex­pert Garvin Heer­ah re­spond­ed to the death of Jay­den Lalchan, a 15-year-old stu­dent from St Stephen’s Col­lege, who end­ed his life be­cause of bul­ly­ing. This in­ci­dent has led to an on­line pe­ti­tion call­ing for the re­moval of the al­leged bul­ly from the school.

Heer­ah de­scribed bul­ly­ing as a se­ri­ous na­tion­al se­cu­ri­ty threat. 

“Bul­ly­ing, whether phys­i­cal, emo­tion­al, or cy­ber, is not just a school­yard is­sue—it is a pro­found dan­ger to the so­cial fab­ric of Trinidad and To­ba­go,” he said.

“This re­cent tragedy un­der­scores the fail­ure of our schools to de­tect and ad­dress the harm­ful ef­fects of bul­ly­ing, which puts the men­tal health of our youth—and the fu­ture sta­bil­i­ty of so­ci­ety—at risk,” he added.

The for­mer head of the Na­tion­al Op­er­a­tions Cen­tre em­pha­sized the ur­gency of ad­dress­ing bul­ly­ing at all lev­els.

“We must strength­en de­tec­tion mech­a­nisms with­in schools, pro­vide train­ing for teach­ers and ad­min­is­tra­tors, and col­lab­o­rate with law en­force­ment to tack­le cy­ber­bul­ly­ing.  

“With­out im­me­di­ate, de­ci­sive ac­tion, we are per­pet­u­at­ing cy­cles of emo­tion­al dam­age that can lead to crime, vi­o­lence, and so­ci­etal break­down,” he ex­plained.

Heer­ah al­so warned about the risk of copy­cat in­ci­dents fol­low­ing high-pro­file tragedies.

“The psy­cho­log­i­cal im­pact on vul­ner­a­ble young peo­ple can lead to im­i­ta­tive be­hav­iour, cre­at­ing a dev­as­tat­ing rip­ple ef­fect,” he not­ed, “This is not just a mat­ter of school dis­ci­pline—it is a crit­i­cal is­sue of life and death, with se­vere con­se­quences for our so­ci­ety.”

Call­ing for na­tion­al uni­ty, Heer­ah urged the au­thor­i­ties and com­mu­ni­ties to act.

“Our chil­dren must feel se­cure in every en­vi­ron­ment—whether at home, school, or on­line. It’s time for gov­ern­ment agen­cies, schools, and com­mu­ni­ties to come to­geth­er and con­front the dan­gers of bul­ly­ing head-on,” he said. “We can­not al­low fur­ther loss of young lives.”

Heer­ah called for a na­tion­al hot­line and sup­port net­works to treat with bul­ly­ing.

“An im­me­di­ate re­sponse mech­a­nism must be es­tab­lished, in­clud­ing a na­tion­al an­ti-bul­ly­ing hot­line that stu­dents and par­ents can ac­cess 24/7. This will pro­vide psy­cho­log­i­cal and le­gal sup­port to those in cri­sis, giv­ing them a path­way to safe­ty,” he said. 

Heer­ah al­so said teach­ers and school ad­min­is­tra­tors must re­ceive spe­cialised train­ing to recog­nise, in­ter­vene, and re­port bul­ly­ing be­hav­iours. 

“This in­cludes cre­at­ing part­ner­ships with men­tal health pro­fes­sion­als and so­cial work­ers who can pro­vide crit­i­cal sup­port,” he added.

If you or any­one you know has been bat­tling thoughts of self-harm please con­tact Life­line at 800-5588; Child­line 800-4321 or the 24-Hour Sui­cide Pre­ven­tion Hot­line 800– COPE (2673).