6% of 15-year-old Valencian students are “frequently harassed.” This is the data provided by the PISA report, the most important in the world in terms of education, which measures for the first time the bullying for autonomies.
But what does “frequently harassed” mean? That “other students have excluded me on purpose, laughed at me, threatened me, taken or broken my things, They have hit me or pushed me, they have spread horrible rumors about me“, I was in a fight at school, I stayed home instead of going to class because I didn’t feel safe, or I gave money to someone because they threatened me.” If a student has suffered one or more of these situations at the same time, enter within this category.
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The international report always measures 15 and 16 year old students, which suggests that the real figure may be even higher. According to data from the Civil Guard, The majority of cases of bullying are concentrated in ages ranging from sixth grade to first and second year of ESO. That is, from 11 to 14 years old, although there are increasingly earlier cases.
Another piece of information that sheds The report is the profile of the bullying victim, or those who are more likely to be a bully in class. According to PISA, Women, migrants, and minors who come from low-income families are harassed more frequently.
Cell phones and harassment
The problem of bullying, far from reducing, has increased in recent years. This was stated by Mª Carmen Jiménez, head of the Inclusion service of the Department of Education during a conference organized this week. Specifically, the cases have been doubled in the last 4 years.
Although this data could be interpretable, and far from being bad news, it could imply that The Ministry knows how to better identify cases or which victims report them morebringing out the reality of school bullying that previously remained hidden.
The latest available data show that more than 1,200 minors have been victims of school violence (at least they appear in the system) in the 2021-2022 academic year. According to data published by the Ombudsman after an investigation by the Ministry of Education, one in four are self-injury and 17% are threats of suicide by students.
As highlighted this Monday by the Minister of Education José Antonio Rovira, and dozens of experts confirmed at a conference on bullying, the misuse of mobile phones in schools and outside of them encourages these situations of bullying and cyberbullying. The average age at which a Valencian minor receives their first device with internet access is 8 years, which is why Rovira announced regulations in schools regarding the use of telephones.
At the level of Ireland
The percentage of students who are “frequently harassed” places the Valencian Community in a good position with respect to the state average and as the ninth autonomy with less bullying in their classrooms. It is still very far from La Rioja (4.1%) and Castilla y León (4.2%) which lead the ranking, but also from Melilla (12.6%), Ceuta (10.7%) and the Canary Islands ( 10.2%), which are the worst in this sense.
At the international level, the country that has most managed to eradicate bullying is Korea, with barely a 1% of students who suffer from it, followed by Japan with 3.7% and Italy with 5.1%. The Community is at the same level as countries such as Portugal or Ireland (in a leading position). The list is closed by countries such as Cyprus and Australia (14.1%) or the United Kingdom (13.6%).