According to the announcement of the Union of Education Workers, the teacher was attacked and beaten on Thursday by the parents of students from another class in front of the parents and students who had returned from recreational classes.
"The student's mother first verbally attacked the teacher together with her father, then continued to pull her hair and knocked her to the ground where her father hit her on the head." All the time they were sending various threats of violence. At the invitation of one of the parents present, the police came to the scene, conducted an investigation, and the teacher was transported to the Emergency Center, where head injuries and a sprained neck were diagnosed," the union announced.
According to the union, the teacher will file a criminal complaint against the parents who attacked her, and that changes to the Criminal Code are necessary, according to which an attack on an employee in education is treated as an attack on an official.
"What should we do until the Criminal Code is harmonized with the European Commission, who will protect us?"
Two incidents in the same day
A similar thing happened yesterday at "Jovan Dučić" Elementary School in New Belgrade. Namely, there was an incident where a biology teacher was attacked.
She was beaten by the mother of a fifth grader because of her grades. The employees then called the police, who came and took a statement.
The battered woman was taken to the hospital, classes were suspended, and the children were sent home. Employees are desperate, upset about what they say is another in a series of attacks on colleagues.
Amendments to the Criminal Code
The protest of educational workers due to the attack on two of their colleagues a few weeks ago resulted in an agreement between the education union and representatives of the Government of Serbia on the amendment of the Criminal Code, which should recognize a new criminal offense in the case of an attack for employees in educational institutions.
Employees in education asked for the amendment of the Criminal Code because recently attacks on teachers and professors have become more frequent. The final straw was the attack on the teacher of the Technical School in Bačka Palanka, who was attacked by a former student during class and caused serious bodily injuries.
The educators demanded that the attack on the teacher be treated as a criminal offense according to the lawyers.
In the new version of the amended text of the Criminal Code, proposed by the Ministry of Justice, Article 344 b states: "Whoever attacks a person employed in an educational institution, in connection with the work that person performs, will be punished with imprisonment from three months to three years."
The text also states that "if, during the execution of the act referred to in paragraph 1 of this article, the perpetrator inflicts minor physical injury on a person employed in an educational institution or threatens to use a weapon, he will be punished with imprisonment from six months to five years".
"If, during the execution of the act referred to in paragraph 1 of this article, the perpetrator inflicts serious bodily injury on a person employed in an educational institution or a member of his family, he will be punished with imprisonment from one to eight years", it was stated in the proposed version of the text.
It is expected that the working version of the text will enter the public discussion in September, and at the end of the year in the parliamentary procedure.
However, the amendments to the Code refer mainly to secondary schools, where older minors and adult students are.
Violence against teachers in elementary school is not covered by these changes, because it is about minor students.
