Focus

Migrant schools fight to protect students

By Wang Wei and Zhao Yanrong (China Daily)
Updated: 2010-05-20 07:46

Students line up to enter a migrant primary school in Beijing.  WANG JING / CHINA DAILY

As protection is ramped up elsewhere, campuses for poor children lack guards. Wang Wei and Zhao Yanrong report

While many government-funded public schools now have at least two security guards - and as many as 10 - patrolling their campuses, schools for the children of migrant workers are not so lucky.

The migrant children's schools are having to think up their own ways to improve security in the wake of a series of horrific attacks on children by knife-wielding assailants outside schools.

Beijing police announced last week that, in response to the spate of knife attacks at schools across China, it would ramp up patrols around schools.

Beijing has 3,060 public kindergartens, primary schools and middle schools. In addition, it has more than 500 private ones. All of those schools will all be welcomed under the protective umbrella of stepped-up police patrols and special school security guards provided by the government.

However, the city has an estimated 1,700 unlicensed primary schools and kindergartens and they are not yet being included in the program.

"Most of the unregistered schools are baby-sitting centers and migrant workers' schools," said Li Dongtong, a senior officer with the municipal public security bureau.

Li said the unlicensed babysitting centers are mostly run by laid-off workers who look after no more than 10 children at a time within local communities.

"Some migrant workers' schools have hired a person to stand in front of their campuses, but they are not real security guards," Li said.

"All these schools are supposed to be under our campus security guarding system, but we haven't worked out a way to cooperate with the unlicensed schools because most of them do not have any extra budget to hire our trained guards."

In Tongzhou district, police said they will install alarms at schools for migrant children and organize family members to patrol the schools.

At the Qingyuan school for migrant workers' children in Changping district, the only safety measure brought in following the knife attacks has been the addition of "protecting students' safety" to the job descriptions of four teachers.

The four now patrol the campus during recess and escort more than 800 students as they enter and leave school each day.

Meanwhile, government funded schools have seen a raft of new measures, including surveillance cameras that cover every corner of the campus and professional guards equipped with a range of protective devices.

Cao Zhan, president of the Qingyuan school, told METRO he was called upon by the Changping education commission to attend a meeting about beefing up security at schools for children of migrant workers in April.

Related readings:  Schools fortify security after attacks  Security guards to watch over schools

"We were required to hire four professional bodyguards for our children by the authorities," he said. "But schools like ours don't have the luxury to do so."

He talked to security companies and learned that one guard's monthly salary was around 2,000 yuan.

"Our best teacher, who has been working at the school for more than 10 years, is only earning 1,500 yuan," he said.

"If I had that sort of money available, I would rather raise teachers' salaries."

Cao said many students from his school who are ages seven or eight have to take the bus home by themselves or walk home alone through an area with chaotic traffic.

"I know there are many potential hazards, but I just don't have the ability to change that," he said.

Across town, the security situation at a migrant children's school at Shijingshan district is little better.

One police officer patrols outside the campus after being sent by the village government. He works with four teachers-turned-guards at Chunlei school for migrant children, said Wang Congzhi, the president of the school.

He wanted to install surveillance cameras but with students paying only 1,100 yuan in tuition each year, he can barely make ends meet.

"I think our children should enjoy the same rights as their city counterparts," he said. "We live under the same sky. Why are we underprivileged?"

Beijing police planned to send at least one police officer and two security guards to each school. The security personnel must be equipped with a helmet, a stab-proof vest, a pair of cut-proof gloves and a rubber baton.

Public schools get financial support for the new campus security personnel from the Beijing municipal commission of education. Private schools are also receiving extra funds to upgrade their security systems, including the hiring the new guards.