The whole-school approach Although school governing bodies should take the lead in developing such policies, all members of the school community should participate in the process. By undertaking a school safety audit and/or a GBV survey of learners, educators and other school staff will provide data to help tailor policy guidelines and procedures to the specific needs of their own schools. In addition, local data will provide examples of the kinds of abuse that are happening in a specific school, and thus show the whole school community that a policy is needed. The roles and responsibilities for developing, implementing and monitoring the policy can be shared by members of the school community. Undertaking a survey, developing definitions of the different forms of GBV, reviewing provincial and national policies, writing the policy procedures, conducting an annual review and organising educational workshops are some of the specific tasks. Taking a wholeschool approach to dealing with GBV, sexual violation and rape will give educators, learners and parents a sense of ownership of their policy.
What should we include in the policy?
workshop
School-based policies on GBV should be in line with national and provincial education legislation. The relevant legislation has been identified in several workshops in this manual (in particular, see Workshop 1, pages 24–26). Before implementation, policies should be reviewed by the District Office of the Department of Basic Education, to ensure that they are in line with national or provincial policies. The policy should be user-friendly and reflect the school culture. A good policy will address the following questions: What is GBV? The policy should include definitions of sexual harassment, sexual violation and rape using clear examples. Refer to Workshop 1 on pages 19 and 20 and the Glossary on page 270 for help. When developing a school policy, the results of a school GBV survey will determine the kinds of behaviour that should be included in your particular list because while GBV is a pervasive problem, the forms of abusive behaviour may vary from school to school.
A school policy on gender-based violence
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