Minister of Education: 'It is unacceptable for teachers to slap students as punishment'

At the meeting with voters in Binh Dinh on November 28, Minister of Education and Training Phung Xuan Nha responded to the case of the Quang Binh teacher.

Affirming that the teacher's act of letting a student slap his friend 230 times was a violation of teachers' ethics, Mr. Nha shared: "I am very sad. The Ministry's view is that it is unacceptable to have such a teacher in the team." The more civilized society is, the sooner it must say no to violence and schools need to take the lead in eliminating that problem. Upon learning of the incident, the Deputy Minister in charge, on behalf of the Ministry's leadership, expressed his opinion and directed the Quang Binh Department of Education to inspect and send a report to the Ministry.

According to the Minister, the behavior of the teacher in Quang Binh has greatly affected the reputation of the industry and the society's trust in teachers' ethics. Along with a number of recent incidents, public opinion has been very concerned about school violence. This is a challenge for the education sector.

However, Mr. Nha believes that most teachers are still dedicated to their profession and love their students. There are tens of thousands of teachers in remote areas who have sacrificed their youth, accepted difficulties, and sent their children back to their hometowns so that they can continue to teach and educate ethnic minorities. Many teachers treat their students as their own children, teaching and caring for them wholeheartedly...

To prevent school violence, last May, the Ministry of Education issued a directive to strengthen management and improve teachers' ethics; develop a project on cultural behavior in schools for the period 2018-2025 to create fundamental changes in the cultural behavior of education managers and teachers. Previously, the Government also issued Decree 80/2017 regulating a safe educational environment and preventing school violence.

"Through this incident, the Ministry will once again continue to disseminate directive documents throughout the industry, to each school and teacher. We will continue to survey and evaluate the real root cause of this situation to find more appropriate and fundamental solutions," said Mr. Nha, expressing his hope that functional units, parents, students... will join hands to build a healthy school environment.

During recess on the afternoon of November 19, homeroom teacher of class 6.2 at Duy Ninh Secondary School (Quang Ninh, Quang Binh) Nguyen Thi Phuong Thuy asked 23 students in the class to slap Hoang Long Nhat for swearing in class, each slapping him 10 times. The male student was then hospitalized for treatment, and returned to school on November 26.

On November 24, Deputy Minister of Education and Training Nguyen Thi Nghia requested the Quang Binh Department of Education to inspect, handle and report the incident as soon as possible. Ms. Nghia said that, regardless of the cause, the teacher's punishment of the student as above is wrong and completely unacceptable. The school must consider and handle it seriously.

On November 26, Quang Ninh District Police (Quang Binh Province) initiated a case of torture that occurred at Duy Ninh School.