Estonian Ministry of Education and Research - MTÜ Kriisiuuringute Keskus

Bullying is a crisis! Keynote speech and a workshop at the KiVa Winter School

kruk — Fri, 05 Jan 2024 22:27:04 +0000

Bullying is a crisis! Keynote speech and a workshop at the KiVa Winter School

On January 4, the 10th KiVa anti-bullying Winter School was held at Tallinn German Gymnasium. Bringing together nearly 200 educators, we gave the opening lecture at the 10th Winter School and conducted a workshop with a focus on bullying as a crisis.

On a crisp Tuesday morning at the beginning of January, teachers, principals, support specialists and other members of the school community gathered at the KiVa Winter School to learn and share experiences of dealing with bullying and bullying as a crisis. “Bullying is clearly a crisis, and it is time it was talked about accordingly,” said Anne-May Nagel, co-founder of the Crisis Research Centre, in her keynote. “One in five school children is a victim of bullying in Estonia. Fellow pupils, teachers, parents and the bullies themselves are also directly affected by bullying – that’s a huge number of people. As it is also known that the effects of bullying can extend into adulthood, leading for example to serious mental health problems, it must be tackled now,” she said.

To stop bullying, the University of Turku has developed a research- and evidence-based KiVa programme, which is already implemented in 26% of Estonian schools through the Bullying Free School Foundation. In schools where the KiVa programme is implemented, the incidence of bullying is significantly lower. “The KiVa programme should be a natural part of the Estonian education system, as it is the only science-based bullying prevention programme,” said Nagel. This way, an important crisis management tool is available to stop bullying as a crisis, it must be put to use.

So, there is an important crisis management tool for stopping bullying as a crisis, but it will only be of use if KiVa is implemented correctly and systemically – this was also one of the important ideas of the day that was discussed.

We also ran a workshop for school leaders, where the participants explored their school’s experience of managing crises through an effective crisis management matrix. The key takeaways from the workshop were the need for more media coverage of education issues in order to get adequate resources from the society and higher levels of government, the courage to take responsibility, and also that tackling bullying as a crisis needs continuous and systematic work. Schools implementing KiVa are on the way to doing so, and we wish them and Bullying Free School Foundation success on this journey!

Jaga postitust:

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Rebels have captured Metsküla

kruk — Fri, 08 Sep 2023 11:39:39 +0000

Rebels have captured Metsküla

The first regional hostage crisis has broken out in Estonia, with dangerous insurgents “seizing” the administrative building of Lääneranna municipality. That’s what happens when the local authority’s bad decision-management forces people to take matters into their own hands.

The Lääneranna Municipal Council has stepped over the edge of community and societal tolerance, and the violent attack on children’s education has caused a lot of thick blood. The case of the Metsküla school closure, however, points to a much bigger concern, namely the decisions being pushed through at local level under the pretext of major reforms and the inability of central government to prevent even truly bad decisions.

Why is this the case?

It must be understood that at the time when responsibility for many areas of life was written into the Local Government Organisation Act (KOKS) as a local government task, rural Estonia was very different. The countryside still had functioning communities, medical care, transport with a post office.

Thus the reality of the rural person was different. Today, many of the services taken for granted by urban dwellers are rural luxuries, available only to car owners, whose peripheral living will soon be rewarded with a car tax.

Responsibility for the organisation of local life has become a key issue for national regional policy. Municipal decisions, especially when taken in peripheral areas, have an impact on the whole country in a context of urbanisation. By making really bad decisions, the effects are felt beyond local life.

This has also been the case in Metsküla, where it has become abundantly clear why it must be possible to challenge the decisions of municipalities at risk in peripheral regions at national level.

Who protects people from local-goverment bogeyman?

Gone are the days when regional policy could be made in the spirit of Excel spreadsheets. Cutting services in a ‘if it is not profitable, it is pointless’ way leads to a vicious circle, where the drift away from services also drives people out of rural areas.

The state is packaging up itself to leave the rural area, it is a cognitive reality. So leaving the countryside is nothing special, it is now much more comfortable to live in the city, at least in terms of services. Yes, Tallinn has its own serious problems, but at least when you go to bed at night you can be sure that school will still be there in the morning.

How many regional crisis do we need to understand that the reality in Estonia was different when the responsibilities of local governments were set out in the KOKS?

The law needs to be more flexible and allow central government to intervene in the follies of the periphery. It is not just a question of local organisation: bad decisions will at some point affect national security, which is based on people’s trust in the state and the existence of homes in every corner of Estonia.

The legal framework must adapt to changing circumstances, it must allow central government to protect people from the arbitrary actions of local politicians in the name of a sacred cause – especially in the countryside. Failing that, Jüri Manor’s erstwhile thought exercise about everyone moving to Tallinn is a self-fulfilling prophecy.¹

Will the municipality turn off the heating?

One might wonder what the coming autumn winter will bring to the Metsküla community, given the attitude of the parish council so far. While the residents of Nursipalu have started to talk about expropriation as a last resort,² the Metsküla community could theoretically also experience a “permanent decline in the quality of vital services” before the arrival of Christmas and elves.

One could start to break the morale of local seven-year-old rebels with a JOKK (read: everything is legally correct) scheme, turning off water, heating and electricity. There is no law to break, because there is no school. Also, there is no need for a special unit to arrive dramatically from a helicopter in the schoolyard, it can be made easier!

The Crisis Research Centre hopes that the leaders of Lääneranna municipality will not be inspired by the above mentioned option and will find a humane solution. Or will the line ministry find a way to intervene? After all, we live in Estonia, not Belarus.

× The opinion piece was published on 07.09.2023 on the Delfi web portal. Photo: Metsküla Primary School (Kaarel Kaisel, 2023).

Sources:

1 Peensoo, P. 2000. Tallinna linnapea Jüri Mõis ennustas tulevikku (Tallinn Mayor Jüri Mõis predicted the future). Eesti Päevaleht, 21.12.2000, (accessed 01.09.2023).

2 Kiisler, V. 2023. VILJA KÜSIB | Hanno Pevkur: Kaja oli väga siiras. See on usu küsimus, kas ta teadis abikaasa Vene-ärist (VILJA QUESTIONS | Hanno Pevkur: Kaja was very sincere. It’s a question of faith whether she knew about her husband’s Russian business). Delfi, 01.09.2023, (accessed 01.09.2023).

Jaga postitust:

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