Students React To School Safety Report
Posted August 30, 2007 12:00 pm.
This article is more than 5 years old.
While some GTA parents are understandably concerned about their children’s return to class next week following the release of a report highlighting security concerns at a North York high school, students reacted with their own suggestions on how to combat the violence.
“Get space and get funding then we will be able to put a lot of programs together for the children,” one pupil, Sheka, said.
Another student, Nathaniel, added, “With all that is going on in the neighbourhood in Jane and Finch, they all don’t seem to get along for some reason and with more space, more rec centres and stuff like that, they will have a place to go.”
Released Wednesday evening the interim school safety report examined the climate at C.W. Jefferys Collegiate, where 15-year-old Jordan Manners was shot and killed on May 23. The report found that though most students at the facility still feel safe there, a number of teens have reportedly been the victims of threats, theft and other crimes.
Human rights lawyer Julian Falconer was tapped to head up the safety panel and among the findings:
- Problems with teacher relationships
- A “gang mentality” that’s present in the school
- Students being transferred from one school to another to break up gang affiliations. But the solution only spreads the problem elsewhere without solving it.
- Bullying
- A dysfunctional relationship between the trustee and the superintendent, who have agreed to mediation.
- New laws that force kids to stay in school until they’re 18
- Changes to human rights legislation that have cut down on suspensions, letting kids get away with more disruptive behaviour.
- Board budget squeezes that may only allow the problems to escalate.
The panel’s final report was due in a month but they’ve asked for an extension until November that would allow them to look at other schools in the Toronto Board as well.
“It’s important to first of all try to get an actual accurate picture of what life is like at C.W. Jefferys. A youth was shot in the hallway and he died. There is an immediate impression that what we’re dealing with is a Jane-Finch war zone school,” Falconer said. “That’s just not true and it’s not fair students there or the families with youth there describe it that way.
“On the other hand, the school has some serious issues, and we took pains to point out that most of the statistics that indicate significant violence at the schools are completely comparable to the surveys done in 2000 for 30 schools (across Toronto). The high school experience in large public schools, it’s not that different. So we then stop and we ask ourselves some important questions. Has the influx of guns into our city, is it seeping into our schools, and the short answer is of course it is.”
One recommendation of the report will be put in place immediately – a safety audit on C.W. Jefferys will happen before kids go back to class on Tuesday.
