Promoting Child-Friendly School Policies in Pokhara Metropolitan City: A Children’s Rights Approach

Abstract

The study was carried out to assess the school policies from the perspective of children’s rights approach with reference to creating a child-friendly learning environment in schools. The descriptive-narrative method was applied to answer the research questions, using the children’s rights approach. Survey techniques and observations were used to collect data. Only 11 schools were selected from the 128 basic schools of Pokhara. All the headmasters and selected practice teachers were sampled for data collection. Three schools where the practice teachers had teaching practice were selected purposefully and eight schools were selected randomly from the eight clusters. One cluster was made with 15 schools. The headmasters were interviewed to collect information on policies and the classes of six practice teachers were observed once. But all had the chances to observe their friends’ classes and provided the group with feedback. The interview schedule and observation checklist were the major tools for data collection. The collected data were analyzed both quantitatively and qualitatively as per their nature. It was found that many schools had their policies to improve their physical and mental environment. It was also found that all schools had a code of conduct for students’ attendance, bullying, fighting, dress code, discipline and respect for the seniors. Such school policies were found to be well communicated with students and parents. Teachers’ superiority over their students were also observed during the visit as students were not speaking up and making their complaints to their teachers. It was concluded that the community schools tried to make the school policies to make child-friendly learning environment, but they were insufficient. Therefore, it was recommended that a proper communication among teachers, students and parents would be an appropriate tool before formulating the school policies.