Cork secondary school teachers voice concerns over online abuse and cyberbullying

SECONDARY school teachers in Cork have voiced concerns over what they describe as the “online abuse of teachers and bullying on social media.”

It comes as a survey by Red C and the Association of Secondary Teachers in Ireland (ASTI) found 18% of secondary school teachers surveyed in Ireland had experienced workplace bullying.

The survey showed that the forms of cyberbullying teachers were subjected to included receiving angry, rude and vulgar messages, or harmful, untrue or cruel comments being posted online.

Videos of the teachers were uploaded without their consent, private information about the teachers was posted, and in some cases, fake websites or profiles were set up in their name and some of their accounts were hacked.

Abusive

Speaking to The Echo, Ann Pigott, Cork-based member and former president of the ASTI, said teachers don’t expect these actions, adding “teachers impart their knowledge and try to help children, and this stuff can be very abusive, and it’s not just nine to five.”

The survey showed perpetrators of work-related cyberbullying are primarily students, at 63%, but sometimes parents of students, who the survey showed are responsible for 20% of online abuse.

Of those who have been subjected to work-related cyberbullying, three in 10 say it happened more than once and for more than one in 10 it’s ongoing.

Conor Murphy, Cork-based English teacher and standing committee member at the ASTI, said that while he has never experienced cyberbullying himself, the figures show “it’s an incredible amount of abuse that teachers are getting” online.

“I know of friends of mine who have received it,” he said. 

“To hear that your image is being spread around TikTok or Snapchat with these condescending or questionable comments undermining you, to hear it through the grapevine then have to go back into classroom and know they’ve seen it is awful.”

He explained it is one of many issues that have arisen with the ongoing role of technology in schools. 

Mr Murphy said that while, for example, certain messaging tools can be useful, they mean students can contact teachers directly out of hours.

“Getting into your car at ten to four and turning off school in your head is no longer the case, we can be receiving emails outside of school hours and having to act on them.”

The survey was published ahead of the ASTI’s annual convention, which gets underway tomorrow.