Abuse at school: Jewish schools are proactive

SUZANNE BELLING

Over the past 10 years, schools have lifted the lid on all kinds of inappropriate behaviour and the Jewish day schools are at the forefront of monitoring and preventing abuse on the part of teachers or other staff members.

Rabbi Dovid Hazdan, dean of Torah Academy, sent out a letter to parents and staff at the beginning of the term emphasising that “the safety of our children is a priority”.

He said that over the past two years key personnel of Torah Academy had been involved in training and workshops relating to the broad area of safety of learners with regard to abuse or sexual misconduct during school and school-related programmes.

“We are, together with the principals, currently in the process of creating a Torah Academy policy document relating to the safety of our learners and staff.”

A workshop was held, conducted by Dalya Erster, social worker at Torah Academy, and psychological counsellor, Kim Lazarus.

“This is not the first time we have had training in abuse,” Erster told SA Jewish Report.

The presentation at TA included different types of abuse – sexual, physical, emotional and neglect. These phenomena “have become an indisputable reality across the Jewish world. We are not creating a drama or crisis but raising awareness of appropriate behaviour. Sexual abuse can happen anywhere, at any time,” said Erster.

The training was to help staff and learners recognise a potentially unsafe situation “and have the ability to deal with it accordingly”.

Rabbi Hazdan added: “We have put in place a comprehensive educational process, addressing children, parents, educators and anyone who comes into contact with the children in our care.” He said the concerns were mainly of a sexual nature but were expanding into other areas.

Rabbi Craig Kacev, director of the King David Schools in Johannesburg, said the schools had in place a prevention of sexual abuse policy, which had to be signed by each staff member.

“Every year we train teachers, sports coaches and those dealing with children and every teacher has to have police clearance to ensure they are not on the sexual offenders’ list.”

Being proactive and taking preventative steps is essential. Rabbi Kacev reported that in the early eighties there was a teacher whose actions with the children were “inappropriate” and a letter of apology had been sent out to parents. But this had been insufficient.

Today there are training sessions with learners, parents and teachers conducted by a social worker. “There is much more awareness and openness to talk,” Rabbi Kacev said. “Our policy covers all forms of abuse, including bullying.

“The King David Schools welcome information – letting us know what previously was brushed under the carpet. Generally, there is more awareness across the board today.”

Marc Falconer, principal of Herzlia High School in Cape Town, said bullying was a problem in all schools, but it had changed over the years.

“At one stage it involved, to a large extent, repeated incidents of physical abuse where a person was picked out because of some or other perceived oddity. Of course, there was also name calling and insults.

“The ubiquity of social media has changed the kind of bullying most children are exposed to – and means that even adults are victims of bullying in ways that would have not been the case before. Whatever the structure and whatever the laws, the very ‘social’ part of social media means that this most common form of bullying is very difficult to contain and to repair.

“As most thinking schools would agree, it is almost impossible to protect children from this kind of bullying and the most effective (probably the only) defence against bullying is to educate pupils (and parents and teachers) and to allow them opportunities to develop empathy which would see the end to almost all bullying of whatever kind, and, specifically, to educate children about how to use social media responsibly.”

The educational process is multi-faceted and programmes are in place to make Herzlia a school in which all its pupils can find a home “and feel acknowledged, celebrated and affirmed”.

Yeshiva College in Johannesburg is committed to providing a safe and appropriate environment for all learners and employees. This is done with continuous education and awareness campaigns, aimed at learners, staff and parent body, said Rabbi Leron Bernstein, managing director of Yeshiva College.

“Acknowledging that abuse is a universal issue that cannot be ignored, Yeshiva College, over the last few years, has been working very diligently, in conjunction with professionals in the field to tighten up on policies and protocols to do all that we, as an educational institution, possibly can do, in order to prevent and deal with any issues of this nature.”

Rabbi Bernstein quoted excerpts from the school’s “Values and Standards Policies”, saying: “Developmentally appropriate life skills and awareness of inappropriate conduct, which is within the context of our school ethos, are continuously arranged and implemented for our learners, from play school to high school.

“Recently we launched a policy, with the guidance of an advocate, bound by applicable South African legislation, and the relevant Torah ethos imperatives and halachic guidelines.

“The policy details appropriate and acceptable standards of interaction and behaviour for our entire campus. These standards place a special emphasis on protecting learners and staff from unwanted touch and abuse, whether direct or indirect, and/or the exertion of any form of inappropriate verbal, physical or psychological influence or control over learners and/or staff.”

Rabbi Bernstein said he had appointed Yeshiva College’s fulltime campus psychologists and social worker as monitors to investigate all reports of concern, “reasonably grounded suspicions, accusations and disclosures relating to abuse or inappropriate conduct of any nature.

“Our counsellors are trained to liaise with all parties involved and will refer to statutory bodies where legally required to do so. They work closely with our principals to ensure all necessary steps are taken in relation to the proper handling of the matter, while being bound by strict professional codes of confidentiality and ethics.”