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What causes school violence?

In the US, school officials are troubled by the increasing acts of violence happening within the school.  A number of children are exhibiting violent nature, and are causing trouble for their teachers, parents and other students.

Yet a question remains.  What are causing these acts of school violence?

School violence can be caused by a lot of factors, some of which are –

·         House environment – a child first learns his values at home.  If a child grew in a wherein the parents are always fighting and using abusive language, then the child will think that this is normal and thus adapts and uses it outside of his home. 

·         Accessible weapons – lethal weapons are easily available through a number of ways.  In today’s era, children can purchase these weapons through an illegal source and then simply use as a tool to bully or threaten other children in school.  There are times that they even killed people using these weapons.  It is evident that incidents of violence wherein a student kills another student is recorded in our history.  The Virginia Tech massacre is one example of such incident which happened in 2007.  Considered to be one of the most dreadful and tragic incident of school violence wherein Seung Hui Cho went on a killing spree on the 16th day of April at Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University in Blacksburg, United States.  During his 2 separate attacks, Seung Hui Cho killed thirty two people and injuring a lot more, and after which he took his own life by committing suicide.  The incident has been considered to be the deadliest shooting rampage by a single person to have happened in the history of the US.

·         Depression and anxiety – children normally does not know how to cope with tension, anxiety and stress, and this sometimes leas to violent behavior.   It is difficult for children to express their depression, and when it becomes too severe they tend to become violent in trying to release this kind of feeling.  These acts of violence may be in a form of theft, bullying, killing other people or even rape.

·         Lack of love and affection – all children needs to feel that they are loved.  When a child feels that he is not loved, then he tends to resort to violence in trying to look for that love and affection he needs.

·         Unsupportive teachers – a child looks up to his teachers and sometimes looks at them as role models.  If by any chance that a teacher neglects a child when he needs help during times of difficulties, then the child might become frustrated.  This frustration often leads to violence, just as so that he will get his teachers attention.  Teachers are there to extend a helping hand and to guide students, and if by any chance they fail to fulfill this duty then their credibility as a teacher will surely be questioned.

·         Career – the chances that a child can become violent rises exponentially when they are not sure about what they want in the future.  This includes their dream as to what they want to do or become in the future.  If you want to help out children and prevent them from becoming violent, then you might want to be a career counselor.  Providing children with a certain path to take and making them realize what they want to be in the future helps in preventing violent attitudes.

School violence is caused by a lot of things.  The only way in reducing or preventing violent behavior is to provide children with the proper support, affection and love that they need.