Dr Gabrielle Jamela Hosein
THE START OF the school term is full of mixed emotions for children.
I dropped Ziya off to begin Form 2 of secondary school with all the advice and positive words that families give.
As always, however, it's important to remember children without safe families, who experience bullying, are at risk of self-harm and have least access to services.
Regarding those without safe families in Trinidad, in the 2019 report of the Children's Authority of TT (annual reports have not been published since then), the highest month of child-abuse reports is October 2018. This peak period follows the July-August holiday.
So we should be alert to children who may have experienced child abuse while out of school, in unsafe care and in conditions of sexual vulnerability over these vacation months.
About one in five (22 per cent) of the clients of the Children's Authority were ten-13 years old. My daughter is 12. It's an in-between age when children are transitioning into adolescence and appearing more independent and grown up. However, that transition can be deceptive because it is also an age of great uncertainty about rights, rules, power, shame, confidence and fear.
We should keep in mind that the highest group of reports are in relation to sexual abuse (22.6 per cent in CATT's 2019 publication) and three times more girls than boys made such reports. The sexualisation of adolescent girls, so well known to us in the Caribbean, increases girls' risk of predation precisely in these years.
As schools open, let's not be naïve about this national reality, with the most reports typically from the Tunapuna to Laventille areas of high density (as rural areas with limited services will make fewer reports). As well, we should remember that witnessing violence in families, such as between parents or other adults, is also a form of violence against children.
It's worth reiterating that for another year the Ministry of Education has no systematic, national approach to educating children about child abuse, and particularly child sexual abuse (around which there is the greatest shame and silence), even though this can help them to identify harm, increase disclosure, and even better protect themselves.
Regarding bullying, school fights marked last year's transition to school after the pandemic. These fights were also related to children and adolescents' online lives, where cyber-bullying also takes place.
UNICEF's 2021 review of violence against children in Latin America and the Caribbean (LAC) notes that bullying and emotional violence are more prevalent in early adolescence for both boys and girls. Boys may experience more physical violence in school, including armed violence, whereas girls experience more exclusionary bullying, such as being left out and having rumours spread about them. Incidentally, emotional violence is one of the least reported and poorly understood forms of violence in children's lives.
When children suffer the effects, and show poor behaviour and school p
