In Focus: Can more be done to tackle bullies in Singapore’s schools?

SINGAPORE: It started with ostracism, led to her dropping out of school and culminated in her being blackmailed into having sex.

The first signs came when Leah, who asked to use a pseudonym, was a second-year high school student and part of a “squad” of about five students at an all-girls school.

But she was the strange one; inability to establish contact and feeling excluded from conversations.

At this point, it had been a year since she had been formally diagnosed with depression, anxiety, and obsessive-compulsive disorder, or OCD, and she made the mistake of confiding in the group.

They immediately rejected her, spread the word about her mental health struggles, and shamed her for harming herself. When confronted, they told her she was “too different” for their taste.

“It seemed really cruel at the time,” said Leah, now 22. “I was upset and really felt betrayed.”

Driven to the brink, she decided to drop out and enroll in a private institution to pass her O-Levels.

But the girls weren’t done, and one of them threatened to tell Leah’s parents about her mental health problems if she didn’t sleep with the girl’s ex-boyfriend.

Though perhaps less visible, Leah’s case was no less insidious than the series of cases of physical and psychological abuse that have come to light in recent weeks.

In September, a film titled Bukit View Secondary School The student’s taunting and kicking to the ground circulated online, leading to a police investigation.

A week later, a clip appeared on the Internet titled: Qihua Primary School an attack on a student by an older boy led to the arrest of five teenagers.

In early October, a Meridian High School student suffered a broken right eardrum after being attacked by classmates.

According to the Ministry of Education (MOE), the average number of bullying incidents has remained stable over the past five years.

For every 1,000 students, there were on average two incidents per year in primary schools and six incidents in secondary schools involving any form of bullying, both inside and outside school.

But since then, questions have been raised, including from lawmakers, about whether schools and teachers are currently sufficiently equipped to confront bullying. If the answer is no, is it time for other authorities, such as the courts and the police, to play a greater role? And how do parents get involved in this process?

While there may be policies and interventions in schools, bullying currently extends beyond school and into the virtual environment, Government Parliamentary Committee (GPC) Education Committee Chairman Patrick Tay told CNA.

There are more situations where teachers are unable to cope with bullying and may even be “exposing themselves to threats and harm,” said Tay, the Pioneer MP.

“It is therefore imperative that teachers are not only equipped to deal with such scenarios, but that law enforcement and other social service agencies increase their capacity to work with schools and the community to combat egregious bullying behavior and bullies themselves. , which they may encounter problems that go beyond the school environment.”