Call for unity on misbehaviour

Press, Issue 33842, 14 May 1975, Page 18

Call for unity on misbehaviour

While the beginnings of social behaviour were felt first and most frequently in the country’s secondary' schools, there was no educational body dealing specifically with social misbehaviour, the president of the southern region of the Secondary School Boards’ Association (Dr R. T. E. Baker) yesterday told the branch conference.

! Recent emphasis on guidance counsellors for secondary schools, and visiting psychological service to primary schools, and increased attention to basic teacher training in welfare, could only be of greatly reduced value while each operated in isolation. There was apparently no joint agency on behaviour and welfare, other than the Committee on Young Offenders, Dr Baker said. The number of welltrained, experienced, and dedicated professionals working in this field in schools was far too few to have their efforts negated by lack of liaison and poor staff work.

School boards should be making greater efforts to launch an early and continuous attack on the problem. “A strong broadly-based representative educational authority could provide badly-needed liaison, not only between different educational levels, but also with the various professionals working for other Government departments or in private agenicies, he said. '