KZN school car burning sparks cellphone debate

An incident where a pupil allegedly set fire to a car after a teacher confiscated his cellphone in class has put the role of the devices in schools under the spotlight.

Video footage showing the vehicle belonging to the deputy principal of Northbury Park Secondary School in KwaZulu-Natal going up in flames went viral.

The deputy principal had allegedly reprimanded the Grade 10 pupil for using a cellphone against school policy.

Democratic Alliance (DA) Gauteng shadow MEC for education Khume Ramulifho said cellphones should be encouraged in schools for educational purposes.

“The department is rolling out Wi-Fi in schools for technology to utilise and enhance learning and teaching.

“What is important is for teachers to urge [pupils] to use their cellphones [only] for education-related purposes,” he said.

SA Teachers’ Union spokesperson Stephan van der Berg said the rights of the many must be weighed and balanced against those of an individual.

“This is especially so in a school context, where parents send their children to school to learn in a safe and undisrupted environment.

“So, when there are reasonable grounds to enact the prescribed procedures to deal with malicious actions, it should be in a way that addresses the problem, as opposed to misusing the procedure outside of the scope of what it was intended for in the first place,” he said.

Hoërskool Wonderboom principal Marius Lezar said cellphones were part of the daily routine at his school.

“Our official policy is pupils are not prohibited from having [cellphones]. However, it may not be visible in class. “If the teacher instructs that it may be used for some lesson purpose, the [pupil] may take it out,” he said.

Lezar said there were clear notices in each classroom indicating cellphones could be used when instructed.

“When pupils do not comply with the policy, the [cellphones] are confiscated and the [pupils] received a fine,” he said.

Lezar said policy violations were recorded on the school’s administrative platform. Gaby Oosthuizen, mother of a teenager going to high school next year, said children should not be allowed cellphones.

This was something she and her husband disagreed about. “Some parents may argue their children had phones to be reached easier, but we didn’t have cellphones in school.

“On the days our parents wanted to reach us, they phoned the school,” she said. Oosthuizen said she had only got a cellphone when she started working.

“I understand times have changed and that it could be helpful in certain situations. But when children are safe on school grounds, it’s the school’s responsibility to keep that child safe.

“The child doesn’t need a cellphone,” she said Oosthuizen said because children had access to the internet, they weren’t spending enough time doing homework.

“They are glued to their phones and I don’t like it. It doesn’t matter in what time we live,” she said.

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