School Mangers' Experiences on Strategies to Reduce School Violence : A South African Urban Schools Perspective

This article reflects on part of the findings of a qualitative study conducted in four secondary schools in Gauteng, South Africa. The main aim of the study was to examine principals, school governing bodies (SGBs) and educators' who are part of the school management team (SMT) experiences of violence in schools and the way in which they were dealing with it. The research questions asked focussed on school violence policies and how they are implemented; the nature of incidents of school violence; gendered nature of school violence; and the causes of school violence. This included investigating the kinds of violence reduction strategies used in the schools and their effectiveness. Data collection was done through open-ended in-depth individual interviews with principals; open-ended focus-group interviews with SMTs, educators and parent member of SGBs; and observations. Findings have revealed that school violence policies derived from the Department of Basic Education (DoBE) school policy are not properly implemented. Findings also indicated that the DoBE lacks the human resources and capacity to adequately provide counselling to both the perpetrators and victims of violence in schools. Generally, the strategies used were not as effective as expected which implies that strategies that are more effective should be used. The recommendation is that instead of using traditional violence reduction measures only, schools should also apply invitational education theory of practice to reduce violence.