Teachers' and Students' Perceptions On Guidance And Counselling Role in Addressing Bullying Behavior in Public Secondary Schools In Kisumu-East District, Kisumu County, Kenya

Abstract

Bullying behaviour subjects many students to physical, social and psychological suffering. Despite it being illegal in schools, studies indicated that bullying is 80-100% prevalent in public secondary schools in Kisumu East District. Reports from Kisumu East District Ministry of Education (MoE) office also indicated that bullying had escalated from 200 cases in 2006 to 900 cases in 2009. This happened despite guidance and counselling programme (G & C) being in place in schools that was meant to manage bullying as a form of indiscipline. The purpose of this study was to establish teachers' and students' perceptions on guidance and counselling role in addressing bullying behaviour among students in public secondary schools in Kisumu East District, Kisumu County. Objectives of the study were to: establish teachers' and students' perceptions on prevalence of bullying behaviour among students; identify teachers' and students' perceived types and forms of bullying behaviour; determine extent to which individual and group G & C approaches were used to manage bullying and to establish teachers' and students' perceived effectiveness of individual and group approaches in managing bullying behaviour in schools. The study was based on Bandura (1998) Social-Learning Theory stating that bullying is learnt from the environment by observation, modelling or experience. Descriptive survey design was adopted. Study population constituted 7,860 form one and two students, 47 deputy Principals and 47 heads of G & C departments from 47 public secondary schools in the district. Stratified random sampling was used to select 37 mixed schools, 5 boys' schools and 5 girls' schools. Saturated sampling was used to select 16 deputy Principals and 16 G & C heads. A sarnple size of 447 students was used in the study as generated by the Creative Research Systems formular (2003). Data was collected using questionnaires and interview guide. Face validity of the instruments was ascertained by experts from the Department of Educational Psychology, Maseno University. A pilot study was carried out among respondents in six schools to establish reliability of the instruments and coefficient indices were determined at 0.79 for students, 0.75 for deputy Principals and 0.76 for G & C heads respectively. Quantitative data was analyzed using descriptive statistics such as frequency counts and percentages while qualitative data was organized into themes, analyzed using summery tables and reported in text form. Findings of the study revealed that bullying was still prevalent as indicated by 139 (31.1%) students, 8 (50%) deputy Principals and 9 (56.3%) heads of G & C; verbal type of bullying was the most prevalent; the most prevalent forms of bullying were taking students' belongings indicated by 96 (24.3%) students, name calling reported by 166 (42%), group isolation indicated by 93 (26.7%) and use of visual messages reported by 22 (5.6%) of the students; individual approach was used more compared to group approach to manage bullying but both were effective in managing the behaviour. It was concluded that bullying is still prevalent and identified types / forms of bullying behaviour need to be addressed. It was recoi:nmended that G & C programme be strengthened by having professional counselors and anti-bullying policy in schools; verbal and the emerging technological/cyber bullying be addressed. Findings of the study may provide useful information to the MoE, teachers and counsellors on the perceived types / forms of