School Violence: Psychologists' Perspective.

Conflict is part of human interaction. A review of some of the literature on the history, as well as on the educational and psychological impact of violence in South African schools, is provided here. It is suggested that intervention and prevention strategies to deal with the effect of violence include training to provide market-related skills to a "lost generation," organizational structures--involving the school and the community--to deal with crisis situations, psycho-educational programs to help students cope with conflict, and ways to address psychological and behavioral problems resulting from conflict. A study was conducted to obtain the opinion of educational psychologists on their role regarding school violence. Results indicated that irrespective of whether the respondents were exposed to violence in the schools they worked in, they agreed that school violence had an extremely negative effect on the educational climate and should be dealt with urgently. Participants made many suggestions on how to improve the situation, but much of this advice was vague in terms of practical implications. The psychologists regarded their main function as providing psychological counseling and therapy to children and their families. It is suggested that the training needs in educational psychology and in violence-related skills be addressed. Contains 61 references. (RJM)