Kids have always biffed each other, especially boys. The fisticuffs lasted for a few moments, then it was over. If an adult was nearby, both kids probably got a shakeup, and that was the end of that.

Because we are no longer allowed to use corporal punishment as a means to discipline children when they are first violent, then that violence may snowball into a bully effect, and someone gets really hurt.

It is a natural instinct to whack an errant child. It does not hurt them, it teaches them. It is only when that discipline is overdone that it becomes abuse. My opinion of course.

Unless the culture of the town and school has seriously changed for the worst (which I doubt and many family names are still in the area) then I suspect this was a one-off incident where a disagreement went too far.

If litigious parents weren’t busy suing teachers because the pencils were too sharp and little Johnny shoved one up his nose, or because Mrs Appleby raised her voice at little Tommy after he called her a slut and now his parents think he needs years of counselling, then teachers wouldn’t be terrified of intervening in schoolyard fights.

If it weren’t for litigious parents Jai Morcom might still be alive today.

I’m sorry for your loss but I still maintain it’s the idiot parents of today that have brought deaths like this upon themselves.

My point: Think before you write, next time. It could offend somebody.

The Herald Sun wrote an interesting piece on a report released by the Victorian Principal’s Association mid last year highlighting some of the crap principals have to deal with.

I’m not saying these specific examples happened at Jai’s school but I do think it’s indicative of widespread parental interference in the schooling system.

If that’s what they’re trying to work with then no wonder principal’s are just giving up and letting kids run riot.

The socio-economic circumstances of the school’s clientelle is also a major influence on student behaviour expecially with group student behaviour. This is a cultural problem rather than one of just parent action/inaction.

School culture though is the proverbial elephant in the room with Jai’s death (if his death wasn’t just a cruel and isolated incident and this could be the case). Fights, in my experience, start to break out or become common place in schools when there is a lack of leadership. In schools where principals or deputy principals are absent for large periods of time (sickness or junkets), or are ineffective, fights follow. Students seem to be able to smell when teachers have no ‘backup’ or when the school is rudderless. The fact that gangs are even able to form speaks volumes about the social climate at a school. The schools I have taught at have all had social cliques (and this is only natural?) but when lines are drawn between these groups and cliques become gangs, trouble surely follows.

Disclaimer: I have no first hand knowledge of Jai’s school or the circumstances surrounding his death and I am only speaking of my experiences in high schools.