DAR AL HARB - NETHERLANDS: "RACIST VIOLENCE AGAINST WHITE PUPILS"...CAN YOU GUESS THE RELIGIOUS AFFILIATION OF THE RACIST ATTACKERS?!?

Physical Abuse of Teachers in 17 Percent of VMBO Schools

THE HAGUE, 17/05/07 - The number of reports of physical violence in schools rose by 40 percent last year. The problem appears greatest in VMBO, the lowest level of secondary education, the Education Inspectorate's annual report indicates.

In total, 1419 cases of physical violence were reported in all sections of education in 2006, compared with 1015 a year earlier, the Inspectorate revealed. The actual figure is probably higher, as most schools do not wish to damage their own reputations.

In VMBO, which is attended by two-thirds of secondary school pupils, pupils used physical violence against one or several teachers repeatedly in 17 percent of the schools in 2006, the annual report disclosed. The Inspectorate also writes that violence between pupils is frequent.

Violence between pupils is "not automatically" violence by white children against immigrants, the Inspectorate stated. Although the organisation is still primarily concerned about "white extremism", a separate registration was made for the first time of "racist violence against white pupils".

Education Minister Ronald Plasterk was confronted in TV programme Knevel en van den Brink with a film in which a pupil pulls down a teacher's trousers and a film in which a pupil literally sends his teacher out of the classroom, instead of the other way round. The minister initially refused to believe that the films were genuine.

Two weeks ago, Amsterdam alderman Lodewijk Asscher reported that a primary school in his city no longer gave lessons about country life because Moroccan children aged 9 and 10 refused to talk about pigs and "broke up the classroom".


Pertinent Links:

1) Physical Abuse of Teachers in 17 Percent of VMBO Schools