Safe school programme staff part of strategy to curb violence at Mitchells Plain schools - WCED

CAPE TOWN - The Western Cape Education Department (WCED) says its safe school programme staff have become part of a community-based strategy to curb violence at schools in Mitchells Plain.

A joint sub-committee, consisting of WCED officials and the SAPS, briefed the Western Cape standing committee on education on Tuesday about its programmes to curb violence at schools in the province.

The briefing follows a spate of violence at schools, with the most recent incident involving an 18-year-old learner who was arrested for stabbing four of his classmates at a high school in Tafelsig, Mitchells Plain.

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WCED deputy director-general, Alan Meyer, said hewould meet with various community organisations in Mitchells Plain on Tuesday night to discuss violence at schools in the area.

Meyer said the Mitchells Plain community policing forum (CPF) and neighbourhood watches had come together to develop a strategy following ongoing shootings and crime in the area.

"Our district office, their safe school staff are part of the programme. So, we have all our principals there to ensure that if shootings happen, our learners are safe within the school property, premises."

Meyer has urged parents not to fetch their children from school when shootings or gang violence happen, saying that learners were safer at school.