Why Does the Tunisian Ministry of Education Neglect Private Education Crimes?

Tunisian Public schools have failed to accept a large number of students and provide them with an adequate and equal education which forced parents to turn to private schools to guarantee a higher academic standard.

However, students found himself more important than the teachers, as the students represent the main source of income for the school. This encourages many students not to respect the educational framework.

A week after the 16-year-old pupil stabbed his teacher with a knife in the school yard, a video circulated on social media, on Tuesday November 12, 2021, showing a student throwing women's underwear at his teacher in the classroom at a private school in Tunisia.

The director of the institute, Kamal Trabelsi, said that the student suffers from behavioral disorders as a result of his parents’ divorce, according to the Tunisian local radio Mosaique FM.

Trabelsi confirmed that the student was expelled from the school, and all the education framework apologized to the teacher.

 

Underwear in the Classroom

Last Friday evening, November 19, 2021, a French teacher at the Al-Nasr Tunisian private school experienced an embarrassing situation in the classroom.

Kamal Trabelsi, the school’s director, told Mosaique FM what happened.

When “this student was in a 3-day punishment period because of eating inside the class during the lesson, the school had organized a visit to the book fair, the student was not supposed to go but he slipped and joined the group on the bus. Taking advantage of this opportunity, he entered the class in which he was not yet supposed to be present. Being next to the door, the student started throwing female underwear at his teacher.”

 

 

The director emphasized that “the aforementioned student was not targeting the professor, but rather the goal of what he did was to make his friends laugh, pointing out that the professor did not file a complaint about the student after all the educational framework apologized.”

Before this incident, the student's mother was summoned many times by the school administration because of her son’s indiscipline.

Trabesli confirmed that the disciplinary council decided to permanently expel the student from the school, according to Mosaique FM.

 

It is Dangerous

Despite the expulsion of the student, the director of the school indirectly “defended” what the 16-year-old teenager did, saying that “the administration of the private school obtained a medical certificate from his doctor stating that the student suffers from psychological disorders," pointing out that he is 16 years old and that his parents will divorce in a few days.

He added that the student was known for rebellious behavior even within his family, but he is far from violence, noting that he “belongs to a well family, but he is not socially stable, which affects him psychologically.”

The video sparked widespread condemnation among social activists and educational institutes, especially since the incident comes after the attack on Professor Al-Sahbi bin Salama at the Ibn Rashik Private School by a cleaver.

During an interview on the Sabah Al-Nas program, Mr. Muhammad Al-Budairi, the teacher who was attacked on Friday, said that he had never witnessed such situation throughout his 35-year career.

He said that he avoided any reaction, which could have dire consequences. He continued, “I prayed to God and dealt with the incident with some wisdom, relying on my teaching experience and personal knowledge of the child's psychology.”

In fact, the teacher said in the same interview that what happened to him “represents a cycle of violence in the school environment, and parents, teachers, and the government have to stop students' brutality against their teachers,” stressing that what is happening is extremely dangerous.

 

Private Schools Pretext

The failure of public schools paved the way to the emergence of private schools, or as some call private higher education.

The phenomenon of private education unveiled a profitable investment institution presented itself as a lifeline for knowledge, but only for those who were able to reach it.

The number of private educational institutions in Tunisia in 2019, reached 800 schools and preparatory and secondary schools that provide services to more than 140,000 students, according to the school census issued by the General Administration for Studies, Planning and Information Systems of the Tunisian Ministry of Education.

This sector currently occupies more than 200,000 teachers, inspectors, and administrators, and represents 30.9% of the total public sector employees, providing services to more than two million students with a general budget of 6,509 million dinars for the year 2020 ($2,274 million), according to the same source.

Most of these private schools consider the student nothing but a monthly income. In fact, their goal is always trying to keep this student behind its doors, convincing his parents that this school is the best and the only choice for their child.

In doing so, the students gained a leverage where they are more prone to do whatever they like (e.g., eating in classrooms), and this created a disrespectful relationship with the teachers.

In her interview with Al-Estiklal, the Arab Civilization Professor, Ghada Tlili Brahmi said that “it is not surprising that private schools are always defending the student because he represents its capital, the school owner’s aim is commercial more than educational so he must support his ‘customer’ so doing wrong or not respecting teachers is not a problem, the most important thing is ‘being at the private school.’”

The Professor added that “the owner of the private school does not consider teachers as ‘educators’ who should have more respect and more rights because of their noble role, but unfortunately, private schools treat teachers as ordinary employees in a commercial company.”

She further emphasized that “the government system is still ruled by gangs and there is still a long way to go.”

Brahmi concluded by saying that, “after 40 years of struggles and calling for a law guaranteeing teachers rights in state schools, the educators’ situation is still unbearable, so imagine the same in private schools.”