- Unruly and dangerous students expelled in their thousands
- By Stephen Drill and Laurie Nowell
- The Herald Sun
- 19/10/2008 Make a Comment
- Contributed by: The Rooster ( 264 articles in 2008 )
THOUSANDS of unruly, dangerous and vicious students have been suspended from Victorian classrooms.
Extorting money, destroying school property, cyber bullying and mobile phone pornography were among the reasons for the suspensions.
Documents obtained under Freedom of Information laws reveal the number of students suspended jumped 10 per cent last year to 18,220, compared with 16,519 in 2006 and 16,549 in 2005.
But figures released later by the Education Department show suspensions have stabilised to 16,143 so far this year. The Sunday Herald Sun found suspensions included:
A YEAR 10 boy who threatened a classmate over his lunch money.
A HIGH school boy who created a fake and damaging profile of a teacher on MySpace.
A YEAR 9 boy who sprayed graffiti on cars in the school car park.
A GIRL who swore at students and teachers.
A MALE high school student who sent naked pictures of himself to classmates on a mobile phone.
Year 9 was the worst, with 3825 students suspended last year.
Even primary school students played up, with 73 preps and 758 year 6 pupils suspended.
Victorian Principals Association chief Fred Ackerman said the state of schools was a reflection of the dangerous society we live in.
"As the behaviour has become more extreme, schools have found the need to reinforce the standards that are expected," he said.
Education Department spokeswoman Maria Ligerakis said bad behaviour was not tolerated.
But she said the suspensions were out of 538,100 students.
Extorting money, destroying school property, cyber bullying and mobile phone pornography were among the reasons for the suspensions.
Documents obtained under Freedom of Information laws reveal the number of students suspended jumped 10 per cent last year to 18,220, compared with 16,519 in 2006 and 16,549 in 2005.
But figures released later by the Education Department show suspensions have stabilised to 16,143 so far this year. The Sunday Herald Sun found suspensions included:
A YEAR 10 boy who threatened a classmate over his lunch money.
A HIGH school boy who created a fake and damaging profile of a teacher on MySpace.
A YEAR 9 boy who sprayed graffiti on cars in the school car park.
A GIRL who swore at students and teachers.
A MALE high school student who sent naked pictures of himself to classmates on a mobile phone.
Year 9 was the worst, with 3825 students suspended last year.
Even primary school students played up, with 73 preps and 758 year 6 pupils suspended.
Victorian Principals Association chief Fred Ackerman said the state of schools was a reflection of the dangerous society we live in.
"As the behaviour has become more extreme, schools have found the need to reinforce the standards that are expected," he said.
Education Department spokeswoman Maria Ligerakis said bad behaviour was not tolerated.
But she said the suspensions were out of 538,100 students.
Source: https://www.news.com.au/heraldsun/story/0,21985,24515390-2862,00.html
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