The National Union of the Teaching Profession (NUTP) has launched a nationwide survey to obtain teachers' feedback on the extent of disciplinary problems in schools.

NUTP president Ismail Nihat today said the month-long survey will involve some 3,000 teachers employed in all types of schools in Peninsular Malaysia, Sabah and Sarawak.

Among others, respondents are required to list out the common disciplinary problems and the actions taken in dealing with the transgressors.

Teachers are also required to provide feedback after counselling sessions with troubled students. Findings from the survey will then be presented to Education Minister Hishammuddin Hussein.

"Although the percentage of students with disciplinary problems is very low - at 2.1 percent, this translates to more than 100,000 pupils. This is a large number. We don't want this 2.1 percent to affect the others," he said during a press conference at the NUTP headquarters in Kuala Lumpur.

Ismail conceded that disciplinary problems have multiplied compared to the previous year when only one percent of cases were reported.

"There are more cases since the figures we have are only for reported cases. We want to overcome this problem so that parents would not have to be afraid of sending their children to certain schools and students would not have to fear going to school," he said.

Task force

Other initiatives launched by the union include the setting up of a task force to identify cases which require further attention by the Education Ministry as well as a campaign to encourage all teachers to bear responsibility for their students' behaviour and not leave the matter to designated discipline teachers.

"We will be interviewing discipline teachers and school counsellors for their viewpoints. Some schools are assigned with police advisers. We want teachers to fully utilise these channels to inform the police of any problems so that they can be dealt with at an early stage," Ismail said.

The NUTP president said the ministry should ensure that its task force set up in response to the death of 16-year-old student Muhammad Farid Ibrahim would be effective unlike previous attempts.

"We were disappointed too. Although a similar task force was set up last year, no action was taken. We didn't know what were its findings," he added.

The issue of school violence and gangsterism once again covered front pages of newspapers following the fatal assault on Farid by several of his schoolmates.

The incident prompted Hishammuddin to call for the formation of an immediate task force to root out gangsterism in schools.

Nevertheless, the Education Ministry has been widely criticised for failing to take concrete steps to deal with the problem which was highlighted last year when a student was killed under similar circumstances at a Terengganu boarding school.

Questioned about the lawsuit that Farid's parents are intending to file against his teachers and school for failing to take action, NUTP treasurer-general Harry Tan said the union would not defend teachers who clearly failed to perform their duties.

"If there has been negligence, we cannot support the teachers. These are matters for the court to decide," he said.

Teachers at risk

On the same note, union secretary-general Lok Yim Pheng said the schools' reliance on the police to deal with severe disciplinary cases did not suggest a failure on the part of teachers to instil discipline in students.

"The problem is that the teachers themselves are not protected. We have cases where teachers have been threatened by the students outside of school. There are cases where teachers' cars are burnt or scratched.

"The discipline teachers have a very heavy responsibility. Who is going to protect them? The ministry must acknowledge that there is a problem before we can deal with it" she said.

On the possible reasons behind disciplinary problems among students, Lok said part of it could be due to negative influences by the mass media, particularly the Internet.

"Some parents also do not acknowledge that their children have problems. They think that the students are just as they are at home and refuse to accept it when teachers bring up the issue," she added.

Meanwhile, Ismail also said teachers should minimise their absences from schools as directed by the Education Ministry in a circular late last year.

"There are now a lot of programmes for teachers but the ministry should ensure that these do not affect the students' education...When teachers are away from the school a lot, there is less control on the students so all sorts of things can happen," he said.