The Ministry of Education and the Parliamentary Committee on Education are rolling up their sleeves to finally make the law on the prevention and tackling of in-school violence operational and, by extension, applicable.
The a law was passed in 2020, with many claims to address the problem that plagues schools, but for four years it has remained dormant in the drawers of the Ministry of Education.
The reason, as has been known for some time, is the inclusion of provisions and references that render its implementation infeasible, paralysing the executive power.
To overcome this obstacle and for the legislation to be implemented, as it is deemed of paramount importance, as it concerns issues of in-school violence and school bullying, the competent authorities took action and worked on specific amendments.
It is worth noting that the Minister of Education, Athina Michaelidou, in a letter to the members of the Parliamentary Committee on Education, dated September 11 2023 (the letter was acquired by philenews), recorded the Ministry’s suggestions for the amendments that need to be made to the said legislation.
These suggestions concern formulations, terms, and references, points that need to be modified or even deleted so that the legislation can be updated and adapted to the data required for its implementation.
From the side of the Parliamentary Committee on Education, the relevant bill has already been prepared for discussion, proposing amendments to the Law on the Prevention and Combatting of In-School Violence of 2020 (as it is officially read).
According to the explanatory memorandum of the bill, its purpose is to amend the said legislation in order to modernise its provisions and to make its implementation feasible with the required decision of the Cabinet, which will put the legislation into effect.
The bill is signed by Pavlos Mylonas and Kyriacos Hadjiyiannis.
Regarding the suggestions of Michaelidou (five in total), the most important are:
- The abolition of the reference to the law on cooperation with the Cyprus Organisation for Standardisation and the development of a national standard, as this would not add anything, since the Organisation specialises in completely different issues, while the issues of managing human behaviour and relationships within the school community are not amenable to the kind of standardisation that the Organisation for Standardisation undertakes.
- Definition of the School Safety Team (SST) by the cross-departmental committee of the Ministry of Education, which is responsible for coordinating the implementation of the Ministry’s policy on the prevention and tackling of in-school violence.
