The high standards of government schools again

No wonder around 40% of Australian teenagers go to private schools. Government education departments don't give a stuff about anything -- except their tea-breaks, of course. I worked in one once so the story below does not surprise me. "Just don't bother us", is their attitude.

It's the poor who have to put up with all this crap, of course. So we see what the "compassion" of a Leftist government really leads to: The opposite of what it claims. They don't give a stuff about the poor. All they care about is sounding good




The mother of a student at a country primary school plagued by years of inappropriate sexual behaviour between its pupils has hit out at the lack of action by authorities. As revealed by The Advertiser yesterday, a country primary school has reported to the Education Department at least 60 incidents of inappropriate sexual behaviour by its students in the past three years. Among the incidents were boys exposing themselves in class, throwing girls to the ground and simulating sex, pulling down other students' pants and underwear, writing sexually explicit stories and the use of threatening sexual language among students. In one case, a student brought a plastic penis to school and sexually harassed another student. The school's plight only became public after the 28-year-old mother complained to her local MP.



The MP used Freedom of Information laws to obtain pages of school incident reports detailing a catalogue of shocking sexual behaviour since 2006. The mother yesterday told The Advertiser her five-year-old son had only been at the school for a fortnight when he was urinated on twice by another student. "This same child later on knocked a toilet door off and asked him to touch his penis, and this same child was also asking my son and other children at the school for sex," she said.

"We reported it to the school. The school counsellor then told us she had already been into the reception classroom a couple of times to talk about inappropriate sexual behaviour. "As parents, we were never told a counsellor had been having sex education talks with our reception-aged children."

The mother said her 11-year-old daughter also had been the victim of violent sexual threats by boys at the school, who had talked of raping her. "Teachers dismissed that as children just learning a new word over the holidays," she said. The mother, who has since pulled her son out of the school, said Education Department officials only took her complaints seriously after she told them she had met with her local MP.

University of South Australia child development professor Freda Briggs told ABC radio yesterday that "this is the tip of the iceberg". "I'm getting desperate parents ringing me every other week about this sort of thing," she said. "We are dealing with teachers ignorance and also ignorance in the department."

Opposition education spokesman David Pisoni yesterday called on Education Minister Jane Lomax-Smith to explain what was being done to address the problem. "The Minister repeatedly refused on ABC radio today to reveal what steps the department had taken to protect children and stop the extraordinary behaviour involving children as young as five," he said. "It is not good enough for the Minister to say these incidents happen in disadvantaged schools and blame forms of media. "This is totally inappropriate sexual behaviour and parents want to know what the Minister is doing about it."

But Dr Lomax-Smith accused the Opposition of using children to "score political points". "I have been assured that the school and district have dealt with the incidents immediately and appropriately when they occur, including advising relevant authorities where necessary," she said.

Education Department chief executive Chris Robinson said swift action had been taken, but he remained "very concerned" by groups of students who were "multiple" offenders. He said some students had been suspended, mandatory reports had been made to child protection authorities and students and parents had been counselled. Police have not been involved, he said.

Source


Posted by John Ray. For a daily critique of Leftist activities, see DISSECTING LEFTISM. For a daily survey of Australian politics, see AUSTRALIAN POLITICS Also, don't forget your roundup of Obama news and commentary at OBAMA WATCH (2). Email me (John Ray) here

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