A new diversity directorate is set to look at values and difference
A RECENT incident at a school in Gauteng has once again brought the challenges of managing diversity in our schools back under the spotlight.
What really transpired between two students at Sutherland High school near Pretoria last month is far from clear. Even the principal, Vernon Rorich, admits, ”We have no record of what was said and done” by either student. But what is clear is that tensions are rife as two students from different race groups invoke the Constitution to protect their rights — one student laying a charge for sexual harassment, while the other claims to be the victim of racism.
The white female learner, Jena (only her first name is known to The Teacher), laid a charge against fellow black male student Musa Khanye for ”pulling her dress up and down, and then [Khanye] put his hand up her dress and grabbed her from behind”, says Rorich.
Lessons in getting along together: Racial and religious diversity in one classroom is increasingly the norm, but making all learners and teachers comfortable with difference is harder to achieve
However, according to a letter to the Gauteng Department of Education from Khanye’s lawyer, Frank Naidoo, this was not an incident of sexual harassment, but of racism. In this account, a ”racial remark that ‘black pupils are rude”’ was made by Jena after Khanye apparently interrupted her conversation with another boy. Khanye’s only fault in this version of events was getting upset by what he considered to be a racist remark and telling Jena to ”shut her mouth”.
As petty as the squabble may appear, it has significant consequences for both learners and the school as well. Jena’s parents have laid a formal charge of sexual harassment against Khanye, who was immediately suspended from school for being ”under criminal investigation”.
Rorich adds that both students’ schooling has been interrupted, since the girl was ”too petrified” to come back to school until near the end of the school term.
Rorich says, ”I don’t think there are racial tensions [at my school]. I think this only became a race issue when the media became involved.” However, he adds that Khanye’s father ”is on about me being a racist”. Rorich is also concerned that the successful reputation the school has established ”is now in jeopardy because of a race issue”.
But Naidoo is not satisfied that it is the media who have given the story a racist slant. ”I spoke to some of the students and all are consistent that there is blatant racism [at the school],” says Naidoo. ”If there is a problem this way or another they know they will be sided against. Black pupils say they are afraid to speak out or complain to teachers or the principal [about how they are treated].”
Naidoo’s is just one voice critical of how the education system generally is dealing with diversity: ”The thing that concerns me is that there should be some pressure on the the principal to put programmes in place to get the children more comfortable in school.”
Rorich says that he held discussions with the Learner’s Representative Council ”about issues of diversity” following the incident, but has no formal school programme to guide students towards accepting each other’s differences. ”We’ve never had to deal with this before,” says Rorich. ”It’s a first for us.”
But this latest incident is far from being unique, as the report on racism in schools by the South African Human Rights Commission revealed last year. In another case similar to the one at Sutherland High, conflict arose at Balfour High school in Mpumalanga — and the Mpumalanga Department of Education has now launched an investigation into other allegations of racism and brutality at the school, two years on. The initial incident involved a white girl walking home with her friends, when a black male student allegedly verbally abused her and pushed her around. The girl’s white male friends then came to her defence, and a fight broke out.
While the principal accepted the event as ”a normal fight between boys”, department representative Peter Maminza says an investigation into the school is necessary because ”a culture has developed in some schools to cover up things — mainly racial problems — to avoid embarrassment”. This follows revelations from another black student at Balfour High, who recently produced x-rays to show how his ribs were cracked after he was allegedly beaten by a group of white pupils.
The often raw experience of conflict between learners from different race or religious groups is what the national Department of Education is hoping to address with its new diversity directorate this month. Headed up by the dean of humanities at the University of Cape Town, Wilmot James, the directorate is taking a closer look at the kinds of values that are being inculcated in schools, and a report is due to be released shortly.
Learning to do the right thing
What does ”tolerance” of differences really mean? Is it simply a matter of biting your lip instead of criticising someone for their choices or appearance, whether it’s their sexual orientation, religion or race?
Kim Feinberg from the Foundation for Tolerance Education believes there is more to it than that. ”Fundamentally, tolerance is accepting yourself and others for who and what they are with patience, love and respect,” says Feinberg. At the root of intolerance, she adds, are insecurities about ourselves: ”It touches self-confidence and self-esteem.”
But even more than being comfortable with yourself and respecting others, tolerance is about ”standing up for what you believe in, and not giving in to mass thought. You have to question what you are taught.”
Feinberg uses history to teach universal lessons to children. The Holocaust, the apartheid regime, and the recent Rwandan genocide are held up to learners from grade 5 to matric as examples of the destruction human intolerance can create. To make these events as real as possible for the learners, a survivor of the various atrocities is brought in to describe their first-hand experience.
Concepts like individual choice, responsibility and consequence are also looked at in the four-part programme. The various stands a person can take to injustice are examined as well, looking at ”bystanders, perpetrators, collaborators and the righteous”.
Feinberg and her team went into about 60 schools last year, reaching some 12 000 children. This year, the theme for the programme is ”the right of the child in the [Unicef] year of peace”.
Says Feinberg, ”The demand is so great that we can’t get everywhere.” To broaden their reach, a teacher training programme in teaching tolerance has been introduced this year.
For more information on the Foundation for Tolerance Education, call (011) 786-2250/1, mornings only.
— The Teacher/Mail & Guardian, April 4, 2000.