Education Ministry to deploy school violence investigators next year

Social Affairs

Published: 07 Dec. 2023, 13:17

Education Ministry to deploy school violence investigators next year

Education Minister Lee Ju-ho, center, and Interior and Safety Minister Lee Sang-min announces measure to improve the burden on teachers investigating school violence at the government complex in Seoul on Thursday. [YONHAP]

Teachers won't be tasked with handling school violence cases starting the next school year.

Instead, there will be personnel dedicated to handling such cases.

The Education Ministry will also increase the number of school-based police officers (SPOs) deployed at schools.

The measures, which the Education Ministry, the Interior Ministry and the National Police Agency announced on Thursday, are to reduce the burden on teachers handling school violence, bullying and abuse cases after incidents of harassment toward teachers by students and parents have come to light in recent months.

Teachers have been under pressure to address fights between students and, in some cases, parents. In the process, some have been exposed to harassment and even to suspension of duties.

Starting March 1, this will change as dedicated investigators will be in charge of interviewing those involved in school violence cases, including the faculty.

The goal is to have 2,700 investigators to station roughly 15 at 177 education support centers under local education offices.

They will be retired police officers or teachers with experience handling school violence cases.

The number was determined based on the fact that 62,052 school violence cases were reported last year.

They will also investigate cybercrime and school violence that happen off-campus, which teachers find difficult to track.

The measure will allow teachers to focus on counseling and working on improving relations between the students involved in violence cases and protecting victims.

"Teachers had to suffer complaints, threats and even lawsuits when handling school violence cases," Education Minister Lee Ju-ho said in a press conference on Thursday.

"Although school violence is a serious issue that our society and [educators] have to solve urgently, trying to overcome this problem by putting the responsibility on teachers and demanding their dedication will only [create another problem at schools]."

Lee said that under the current system, teachers have to be involved in every step of handling school violence cases.

"In many cases, [teachers] couldn't concentrate on their job as educators," Lee said. "We need to improve the system in handling school violence cases so that teachers could be free from the overwhelming burden of addressing school violence and to be allowed to focus on their role as educators."

Interior Minister Lee Sang-min said in the press conference that teachers have been demanding practical measures to better their working conditions since the death of a teacher at Seo2 Elementary School.

The 24-year-old teacher's death sparked outrage among teachers across the country.

Since the elementary school teacher's death in July, four other teachers took their own lives.

The government also announced its plan to deploy 105 additional SPOs to schools to strengthen security. Korea currently has 1,220 SPOs.

Their responsibilities will be expanded to include cooperating with school violence investigators and serving on school violence review committees, in addition to their current role of protecting school violence victims and collecting information.

The Education Ministry will also increase the number of legal experts in school violence review committees at local education support centers.

A special team consisting of the school violence investigator, SPO and lawyers will also be set up to review school violence cases.

Lee Ju-ho said the ultimate goal is to eliminate school violence by changing cultures within schools through education.

"We want to fundamentally create a culture where students, parents and teachers work together to build a better school and a culture where everyone respects each other," he said. "The fundamental solution against school violence is education."

BY LEE HO-JEONG [lee.hojeong@joongang.co.kr]