Can Teachers be Bullies Too?

Everyone knows that bullying by kids towards kids occurs very frequently, and has yet to be stopped. Whether that happens or not within the techno-generation, we will never know for sure. But, lets take another approach on bullying that may leave you with a sour taste in your mouth. When your child/children goes to school and comes home complaining about being bullied, you automatically think about it being done by other children and immediately get in contact with the parents of the bullies. But what do you do when the bully is the teacher? Stuart Twemlow, MD, psychiatrist, passed out an anonymous survey directed towards 116 teachers from seven elementary schools. From this survey he concluded that 45% of teachers had admitted to bulling a student. Twemlow defines bulling as, "using power to punish, manipulate, or disparage a student beyond what would be a reasonable disciplinary procedure." There are many possible explanations for why teachers would bully students, reason such as envy of the student, the student may remind them of someone they don't like or maybe it's because they are having issues with social relations.The teacher may be experiencing job burnout or marital problems. Work precariousness may also be another cause. The teacher may feel that their job integrity is in jeopardy.  It is not the fact that the teacher is trying to be deviant, trying to break norms, or even hurt students on purpose but rather they too are human and experience hardships that people must consider.  Twemlow also discusses that there are two types of teacher bullies, "Sadistic teachers" and "Bully-Victim teachers.  Sadistic teacher get pleasure from humiliating a student whereas a Bully-Victim teacher will be more passive and allow a class to get out of hand, only to respond to this with rage.  Also, he states that there is no difference between male or female teachers with regards to who will bullying and who won"t.  Twemlow later states effective strategies to combat teacher bulling.  With regards to some of the functionalist theorists, you could look at teacher bullying with regards to R.Agnew 's General Strain Theory.  He suggests that a negative affect must be accompanied by strain, to cause an individual to be deviant.  A teacher may be subjected to many types of negative affects such as a loss of a loved one or he feels he is unable to achieve certain goals.  It is also quite possible that they don't have the necessary resources (Economic, Psychological, or Interpersonal) to help combat the strain.  This is why I say that, even teachers are human.  

If you want to read the article for yourself, please check it out at: http://www.webmd.com/parenting/features/teachers-who-bully

Ryan Lowry