Sharjah: A public school teacher is being investigated by the Sharjah Educational Zone for alleged misconduct and beating a pupil.
The seventh-grade pupil was beaten severely by the teacher, his father said, in an official complaint that he lodged with the educational zone.
The incident took place when the teacher sent the pupil out of the classroom and asked him to go to the school administration’s office as punishment after the pupil accidentally touched the teacher’s shoulder while removing the cap of his pen.
The zone received a detailed report from the school administration upon the father’s complaint in which he said the teacher sent his son out of the classroom and asked him to go to the principal’s office. “When my son returned to the classroom, the teacher started to speak to him in a very rude manner and then he punched and kicked him for almost 10 minutes in front of his classmates,” the father said.
“My son was verbally and physically abused by the teacher, and he humiliated him in front of his classmates,” he added.
Mona Shuhail, Deputy Director of the Sharjah Educational Zone, said, “We ordered the setting up of a committee to probe the incident immediately after we received the father’s complaint.”
She said the father submitted the complaint along with a medical report and photographs showing bruises on several parts of his son’s body.
Corporal punishment and beating of pupils is totally banned by the Ministry of Education, Mona emphasised.
She explained that the problem started when the pupil removed the cap of his pen while the teacher was speaking to him. The pen’s cap touched the teacher’s shoulder and this is why he sent the pupil out of the classroom.
She denounced the teacher’s misconduct and physical abuse, stressing the ministry’s ban on corporal punishment. Mona said a report will be submitted to the ministry after the Legal Affairs Department finishes its investigation and takes testimonies from pupils.
The father called for punishing the teacher and appealed to the Ministry of Education to take serious action to prevent the recurrence of such incidents.
Corporal punishment is not a solution to pupils’ problems or misconduct, he added.
“We are against such practices and we always stand by pupils and against beating and intimidation as the ministry’s message is clear and there are rules and regulations if pupils make mistakes or misbehave,” Mona said.
She called on schools to abide by the code of conduct and disciplinary regulations, as well as to refrain from traditional methods of disciplining pupils.
Nawal Al Ramahi is a trainee at Gulf News
