Violence means more than being hit
- Claim
- The Convention tells governments to protect you from every form of violence, mental as well as physical, and its committee says that includes school.
- Instrument
- CRC, article 19(1); CRC General Comment 13 (2011), paragraphs 17, 21, 33 and 34 (the committee's reading).
- Quote
- "protect the child from all forms of physical or mental violence" (CRC, art. 19(1)). The UN committee that reads the CRC says that phrase "does not leave room for any level of legalized violence against children" (GC 13, para 17).
- What it means for you
- Article 19 protects you wherever an adult has the care of you, and school counts: the caregivers the committee reads into that phrase include "education, school and early childhood personnel" (GC 13, para 33), and "Usual care settings include family homes, schools and other educational institutions" (GC 13, para 34). Mental violence is on the list too. The committee's own examples include "Insults, name-calling, humiliation, belittling, ridiculing and hurting a child's feelings" (GC 13, para 21). The committee also says how badly you were hurt and whether anyone meant to hurt you "are not prerequisites" for calling something violence (GC 13, para 17).
- Where it often fails
- Shouting, threats and steady mockery get filed as personality, not as violence, so nothing is written down and nothing is counted. A student who says it is hurting is told to grow thicker skin.
- What you can ask for
- Ask whether your school has a written policy on violence, and what that policy counts as violence. Ask who you tell, whether a report is written down, and what happens after you make one.
Punishment has a limit
- Claim
- Rules and consequences are allowed. Under the Convention, as its committee reads it, punishment that is meant to hurt you is not.
- Instrument
- CRC, article 28(2); CRC General Comment 8 (2006), paragraphs 11, 13 and 22 (the committee's reading).
- Quote
- School discipline must be administered "in conformity with the present Convention" (CRC, art. 28(2)). The UN committee that reads the CRC defines corporal punishment as any punishment where "physical force is used and intended to cause some degree of pain or discomfort" (GC 8, para 11).
- What it means for you
- Article 28(2) sets two tests, not one. Chapter 1 has the first, your dignity. The second is the whole Convention, so a punishment also has to survive article 19, article 12 and the rest. The committee's definition of corporal punishment ends "however light", which means a single slap is inside it, and it calls ending violent and humiliating punishment "an immediate and unqualified obligation of States parties" (GC 8, para 22). None of this is an argument against discipline: the same committee says it is "not in any sense rejecting the positive concept of discipline" (GC 8, para 13).
- Where it often fails
- A policy bans hitting and a teacher does it anyway, because nobody has ever been asked about it. Or the punishment moves to what leaves no mark: long humiliations in front of the class, or a word said quietly that you carry all week.
- What you can ask for
- Chapter 1 has the basic asks, including the written discipline policy and an explanation of any punishment. Here, go one step further. Ask for the list of punishments the school allows. Ask that a punishment given to you be recorded, with the reason, and ask who can review it.
What students do to each other is the school's problem too
- Claim
- The UN committee that reads the CRC counts violence between students as violence the Convention covers, and says the adults in charge have a part in stopping it.
- Instrument
- CRC, article 19(1); CRC General Comment 13 (2011), paragraphs 21(g), 27, 49 and 63 (the committee's reading).
- Quote
- The UN committee that reads the CRC describes violence among children as "violence, often by bullying, exerted by children against other children" (GC 13, para 27). It underlines the importance of children's participation in "the elimination and prevention of bullying, and other forms of violence in school" (GC 13, para 63).
- What it means for you
- The committee treats bullying as a form of violence under article 19, not as a separate lesser thing, and says that although children are the ones acting, the role of the responsible adults "is crucial" (GC 13, para 27). Bullying that happens on a phone is named in the same list, "including via information and communication technologies" (GC 13, para 21). One line is worth knowing before you ask for a crackdown: the committee wants measures that "do not exacerbate violence by taking a punitive approach" (GC 13, para 27). Punishing everyone harder is not what the committee asks for.
- Where it often fails
- It gets handled as a private quarrel between two students, so both are warned and nothing changes. Reports go nowhere visible, so people stop making them. Online it follows you home, and the school says it happened off school grounds.
- What you can ask for
- Ask what the school does when one student reports another, how long each step takes, and whether it is written down. Ask whether students helped write that rule; your right to be heard on it is in chapter 4, Your voice counts. Ask for "safe, well-publicized, confidential and accessible support mechanisms" by name if it helps, because that is what the committee asked states for (GC 13, para 49).
The law where you live may already ban it
- Claim
- In most countries, corporal punishment in school is already unlawful, and you can check yours.
- Instrument
- CRC General Comment 8 (2006), paragraphs 32, 43 and 45 (the committee's reading); End Corporal Punishment global progress table.
- Quote
- Where national law still authorises corporal punishment in schools, the UN committee that reads the CRC says "the Convention requires the repeal of all such provisions" (GC 8, para 32).
- What it means for you
- As at March 2025, the End Corporal Punishment global table counts 137 states where corporal punishment in schools is "Fully prohibited" and 62 where it is "Not fully prohibited" (table, March 2025). Those are counts of laws, not counts of classrooms. The Atlas on this site carries the same March 2025 reading as a map layer, corporal punishment prohibited in schools, and repeats it on each country card under School, so you can look up your own country instead of guessing. One place the table counts, Kosovo, has no card on the Atlas, so read its row in the table itself.
- Where it often fails
- "Not fully prohibited" sometimes means partly: banned in primary school but not secondary, or in state schools but not private ones, or in some parts of a country but not others. More often it means not at all. Of the 62, the table marks 9 as partial and 53 as no prohibition, so check your own country on the Atlas rather than assuming a partial ban. And a law on a page is not a hand stopped in a classroom. GC 8 says as much: prohibition on its own "will not achieve the necessary change in attitudes and practice" (GC 8, para 45).
- What you can ask for
- Look your country up on the Atlas, then ask the school which law it believes applies to it and to see that rule in writing. If it is prohibited where you live and it is still happening, ask who outside the school a report goes to; chapter 7, What you can do, walks through the general routes, which differ by country. The committee asked states to give students "immediate and confidential access to child-sensitive advice, advocacy and complaints procedures" (GC 8, para 43).
Schools where there is fighting
- Claim
- In armed conflict, most governments have said in writing that they will do their utmost to keep schools safe. It is a political promise, not a treaty.
- Instrument
- Safe Schools Declaration (2015), a political commitment that states endorse.
- Quote
- Endorsing states declare: "We will do our utmost" to see that "places of education are places of safety" (Safe Schools Declaration). The Declaration calls the guidelines it endorses "non-legally binding, voluntary guidelines" (same text).
- What it means for you
- Endorsing states say they will bring those guidelines on the military use of schools into national policy as far as possible and appropriate, make every effort to collect data on attacks, "Investigate allegations of violations of applicable national and international law", seek to keep education going, and meet regularly to review how it is going. Most of that is worded as an effort, not a guarantee. Norway holds the list of endorsements, and 123 states were on it when this page was read on 2026-09-19 (endorsements page). The Declaration does not create new law; it stresses "full respect for applicable international law", which lives in other instruments.
- Where it often fails
- Schools are still hit, still used by armed forces, and still shut. A signature in a capital city does not reopen a classroom, and students whose school has closed lose years that no later promise gives back.
- What you can ask for
- If your school has closed or been taken over, ask where the classes have moved, how your record of study travels with you, and what the plan is for exams. If you have been displaced, chapter 1 has the questions to ask about which documents enrolment truly requires.