The incident occurred on Tuesday. In a primary school in St. Gallen, a teacher slapped a student. “The girl concerned and three other children immediately asked the school management for help,” explains a letter sent to parents, which also specifies that: “For reasons still unexplained, a teacher lost his blood- cold in class and hit a child in the face.
Students who requested it were supported within the framework of a joint interview, by the management and other teachers. “They were able to express their feelings and regain confidence. We ate a pizza together and, after the discussions, we played a game at the children’s request,” the management underlines in its letter. Although the circumstances that led to this situation have not yet been clarified, management believes that “under no circumstances should such a reaction occur.” The teacher, a specialist teacher who was replacing from October to January, was immediately fired.
And the City of St. Gallen confirmed: “On Tuesday morning, a teacher at a primary school behaved unprofessionally. There have been physical boundary violations, which we do not tolerate. We worked on the situation with the children and parents. For this purpose we have a protection concept, known to all teachers,” explains Martin Annen, head of the schools department.
The father of one of the students at the school emphasizes for his part that “most parents are horrified”, but that, according to several of them, “this was to be expected, because we notice that the teachers do not control the students. The man adds that “during the visiting days, we could see that the children did not listen to the teachers and were extremely wild and noisy in class. Younger children copy the bad behavior of their older peers.”
