It was investigated that about 9 out of 10 teachers felt anger안전놀이터 in relation to the recent death of a new teacher at Seoi Elementary School in Seocho-gu, Seoul.
On the 22nd and 23rd of this month, the National Teachers and Education Workers’ Union revealed the results of a survey of 14,450 kindergarten, elementary, middle, and high school teachers nationwide on the 22nd and 23rd of this month.
When asked about their feelings after this incident, 87.5% of respondents answered that they felt ‘anger’. 75.1% responded that they felt helpless and 68% felt sorry. Many teachers said they felt depressed (61.1%), self-defeating (59.2%), and anxious (44%).
The KTU explained that teachers with less than five years of experience were more likely to be angry, and elementary school teachers by school level were more likely to be angry.
Among the items that experienced difficulties in educational activities, ‘when guiding students who are unable to adapt to school’ (95.3%) was ranked first. This was followed by responses such as ‘excessive work’ (87.1%), ‘absence of support and protection system of the school community’ (84.1%), ‘excessive complaints from parents’ (81.6%), ‘unreasonable assignment of duties’ (67%), and ‘administrator’s abuse of power and irresponsible attitude’ (62.3%).
When there were complaints from parents, the most common response was that they received ‘support from fellow teachers’ (65.2%), but ‘no help’ (28.6%) came in second. Those who received ‘support for school managers’ accounted for 21.4%, and 18 teachers who received ‘support for teacher organizations or unions’.
Most of the teachers (95.5%) chose ‘no effect’ on the effectiveness of the Ministry of Education and Office of Education measures to guarantee teaching authority.
As for measures to protect teachers from abuse of power by parents and malicious complaints, ‘strengthening punishment for perpetrators, such as legalization of compulsory reporting of violations of teaching rights to the superintendent of education,’ was the highest (63.9%). This was followed by ‘parent awareness raising and education and procedures for confirming oaths, etc.’ (45.9%), ‘measures for administrators to respond directly to complaints’ (45.6%), ‘bullying prevention system through personal contact’ (28.3%), and ‘school phone power-up warning coloring and replacement of recordable phones’ (23.2%).
As for what the education authorities should do to prevent recurrence and guarantee teaching rights, ‘prevention of punishment for child abuse in legitimate educational activities through revision of relevant laws’ was the most selected (89.2%).
One teacher told the Teachers and Teachers’ Union, “It is difficult to treat these problems as personal ability problems and the individual teachers have to take responsibility for all of these problems. The final handling is the responsibility of the teacher, but there is no one to help, and the atmosphere of ‘solving it yourself’ makes me feel like I was thrown out alone.” Another teacher said, “Even if the infringement of teacher rights occurred, the education office and even the lawyer were not on the side of the teacher. They advised, ‘Teachers are also injured, so solve it well.’