Carisa Lee

Re­porter

carisa.lee@cnc3.co.tt

Pres­i­dent of the Trinidad and To­ba­go Na­tion­al Coun­cil of Par­ent Teacher As­so­ci­a­tions Inc. (NPTA), Wal­ter Stew­art, says vi­o­lence among stu­dents con­tin­ues to oc­cur even at schools with po­lice of­fi­cers sta­tioned on the com­pound.

At the start of the new aca­d­e­m­ic year, Gov­ern­ment de­ployed 95 Spe­cial Re­serve Po­lice (SRP) of­fi­cers over 70 in­sti­tu­tions as part of the School-Ori­ent­ed Polic­ing Ini­tia­tive (SOPI). The move was in­tend­ed to re­duce school vi­o­lence and im­prove safe­ty.

How­ev­er, Stew­art said that de­spite the ini­tia­tive, in­ci­dents of in­dis­ci­pline and ag­gres­sion per­sist.

“This brazen act that we see tak­ing place, where there seems to be now no re­gard, no re­spect for po­lice, for law en­force­ment, is wor­ry­ing and is dam­ag­ing as well to the sys­tem... They’re al­most stand­ing up to you as a po­lice of­fi­cer,” he said.

Speak­ing on CNC3’s The Morn­ing Brew, the new­ly re-elect­ed NPTA pres­i­dent said he had hoped for greater im­pact from the ini­tia­tive, which has been in place for less than two months.

“Both the NPTA and the po­lice agree there has been a slight re­duc­tion in in­dis­ci­pline and vi­o­lence in schools, but not at the rate we an­tic­i­pat­ed,” he not­ed.

“And we are hop­ing that by the end of this term, cer­tain­ly by the end of the sec­ond term of this aca­d­e­m­ic year, we will be able to see a dras­tic im­prove­ment in our school in­dis­ci­pline and school vi­o­lence,” Stew­art said.

Stew­art al­so urged par­ents to avoid tak­ing mat­ters in­to their own hands when dis­putes arise at schools. His ad­vice fol­lowed a re­cent al­ter­ca­tion at a Port-of-Spain school, now un­der po­lice in­ves­ti­ga­tion, in­volv­ing a par­ent, stu­dents, and staff mem­bers.

CCTV footage from in­side the school of­fice re­port­ed­ly shows a woman grab­bing a stu­dent’s shirt and point­ing her fin­ger in an­oth­er stu­dent’s face dur­ing the con­fronta­tion.

“If your child is in­volved in in­ci­dents like this one, con­tact the Na­tion­al Par­ent Teacher As­so­ci­a­tion and let us act on your be­half. Don’t take the law in­to your own hands. It’s detri­men­tal not on­ly to you but to your child, to the sys­tem as well,” Stew­art urged.

He re­mind­ed par­ents that emo­tions can run high dur­ing such in­ci­dents but em­pha­sised that the NPTA pro­vides for­mal chan­nels for as­sis­tance.

“Reach out through your unit pres­i­dent or re­gion­al pres­i­dent. We can pro­vide time­ly so­lu­tions rel­e­vant to the is­sues af­fect­ing your child at school,” he said.

Po­lice are con­tin­u­ing in­ves­ti­ga­tions in­to the in­ci­dent. The Min­istry of Ed­u­ca­tion has not yet is­sued a state­ment.