School social workers' and educators' experiences on school-based violence: suggestions for stakeholder support

Abstract

School-based violence (SBV) is a phenomenon that burdens many countries globally. A substantial proportion of schools and governments are still struggling to find a solution to it. There are a limited number of reports on stakeholder support for SBV within the Johannesburg East District. The study's first goal was to gain a thorough understanding of the educators’ and school social workers’ experiences and perceptions of SBV and, secondly, to proffer their suggestions for stakeholder support to prevent SBV. The theoretical framework employed to anchor this study included the bio-ecological perspective and the peace education theory. The researcher employed the qualitative research approach and utilised phenomenology as the research design strategy, with a mixture of the descriptive, explorative, and contextual research designs. The purposive (judgement) and the techniques of snowball sampling were utilised. The study revealed that the nature of SBV is verbal and physical violence, and bullying. The causes of SBV are the perpetrator and victim’s personality, the use of substances, home circumstances, neighbourhood, socioeconomic conditions, and social media. It takes a village to raise a child and therefore the cooperation of all the stakeholders is crucial in ensuring the prevention of SBV. Suggestions for stakeholder support in curbing SBV include employing school social workers and involving parents. Teachers, principals, and school governing bodies are urged to play a more prominent role.