34% of Roma children who have been bullied at school do not want to study. 44% believe that they are unable to independently counteract the abusers and that only adult intervention can protect them from continued bullying. Only half of those surveyed know how to avoid violence and where to turn for help if necessary.
These are the key results of the study “The State of Bullying of Roma Children in Educational Institutions”. It was conducted among about 500 teachers, parents and schoolchildren in the Transcarpathian, Zaporizhia and Odessa regions by specialists from the Blago charity foundation, the REYN-Ukraine network with the support of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Finland and the international human rights organization Minority Rights Group.
Representatives of the Transcarpathian OVA, school principals and others discussed how to strengthen work on preventing and combating bullying of Roma children in educational institutions and raise awareness of all participants in the educational process about the causes and consequences of this phenomenon today during a thematic roundtable in Uzhgorod.
“Roma children often become victims of discrimination not only among their peers, but even by adults. Our study is not just statistics, but an important step towards ensuring that teachers, parents and administrators do everything possible together to change the situation and stop this attitude. Our team has developed specific practical advice, the implementation of which will help make schools safer for all children,” said Eleonora Kulchar, director of the Transcarpathian Regional Charitable Foundation “Blago”.
According to the survey, Roma children are most often bullied because of their ethnicity, behavioral characteristics, language barrier, cultural differences and socio-economic status. Secondary school students usually become victims of bullying, sociologist and researcher Yulia Khatsanovska emphasized during the presentation of the monitoring results.
“Our study showed that bullying of Roma children in educational institutions is a “silent” but unresolved problem. Schoolchildren are subjected to psychological bullying or physical violence. There are also cases when they turn from victims into perpetrators,” emphasized Yulia Khatsanovska.
The problem of bullying of Roma children can be overcome only through joint efforts of teachers, school administration, students, parents and the community. The participants of the round table concluded that for this it is first of all important to work on creating a safe learning environment, implement anti-discriminatory educational programs, conduct trainings for teachers and parents and carry out systematic monitoring of the situation.