Boys at a prestigious private school who are repeatedly caught vaping or smoking e-cigarettes could face suspension and be forced to complete a vape education course before being allowed back.
Michaelhouse rector Antony Clark confirmed to TimesLIVE Premium that they have begun to introduce the new sanction that involves an American-style course “which parents need to fund and has to be done at home prior to a boy returning”.
The online course at the KwaZulu-Natal Midlands school, where annual board and tuition fees is R347,680, will have to be completed by repeat offenders.
He confirmed that about 10 pupils have been caught vaping and received “internal punishments” such as being denied the opportunity to apply for weekend leaves.
“Every boy has an allowance of three Saturday night leaves a quarter, where they can go home with parents, or to the homes of friends for the night.”
Said Clark: “It is a concern, as it is in the wider society, particularly because of the variety of substances which can be used in a vape and the difficulty of detection.”
Asked how the school was dealing with the problem, he said they were being proactive through inviting guest speakers to talk about the dangers of vaping.
“We are attempting to educate our boys about the dangers of vaping through expert opinion and also providing clarity on the repercussions they face if they are involved.
“Many senior boys have engendered a sense of pride in implementing an approach in which it is not cool to vape in the school context.”
Clark said that vaping, as a transgression, has been included in the school’s code of conduct.
Organisations in the US are offering vaping online courses, as well as a course known as VapeEducate, to pupils to educate them about the risks and dangers of vaping.
The principal of a school in Gqeberha said vaping “is increasingly a problem in all schools, us included”.
“It is also a problem that is rearing its head among younger children and frustratingly is enabled by parents.”
He said vaping was included in the code of conduct in the same category as smoking but that this may change depending on what is being vaped.
“If it’s cannabis oil being vaped, for example, it will be dealt with under a different category.”
We are attempting to educate our boys about the dangers of vaping through expert opinion and also providing clarity on the repercussions they face if they are involved.
— Antony Clark, Michaelhouse rector
The principal said many parents were still under the impression that vaping “is part of the process of smokers weaning off cigarettes and therefore seem to be more accepting of it”.
“Schools and education campaigns are not going to turn this problem around without strong government legislation that regulates how vaping can be advertised and holds companies accountable.”
He said it was “extremely difficult for schools to fight against the multimillion-rand subculture that these companies are establishing”.
“For example, there are vaping companies that appoint teenage ambassadors who go about selling and promoting their products. Many of these campaigns are communicated through social media and are therefore hidden from schools and parents.”
A Groenewald, chair of the governing body of Ferrum High School in Newcastle, northern KwaZulu-Natal, said vaping was not a major concern as only six pupils were caught with vapes.
“We are fortunate to have a disciplinary officer at school who monitors all the bathrooms and the playgrounds for any misconduct. We also have prefects on duty at the bathrooms and on the playgrounds during breaks to monitor misconduct.”
Groenewald said they made a request to police to bring in sniffer dogs last year to do a general search but were informed that there were no canines in the area.
Tim Gordon, CEO of the Association of Public Boys’ Schools of South Africa (Apbsa), representing 40 schools, told TimesLIVE Premium that they had been involved with a vaping study undertaken by Prof Richard van Zyl-Smit, a consultant pulmonologist at the University of Cape Town’s lung institute.
“Since the pilot research undertaken among a selected group of our member schools early last year, the study is now also surveying the situation in girls’ and co-educational institutions, as well as moving into smaller town and rural schools and those serving socioeconomic groupings across the board.”
He said valuable information is being collated and analysed, “but it must be recognised that addressing a major social ill such as vaping is a journey rather than a destination”.
“Schools continue to work hard at educating pupils and parents about the dangers of vaping. We hope and trust that this may be slowing the spread of the habit, but it would be naive to suggest there has been a massive turnaround in the use of vapes at this early stage.”
Van Zyl-Smit told TimesLIVE Premium they will “hopefully” survey schools countrywide in the third school term staring in July.
“Our pilot data indicates that in high-income schools in major cities vaping is a major problem with in excess of one in five matric students vaping.”
He said many adolescents are vaping because of stress and anxiety, adding: “The growing lungs in young people may also be damaged by the vapours and chemicals in the vape liquids.”
The Sunday Times reported two weeks ago that Hilton College invited a leading lung specialist to educate pupils and staff on the health risks of vaping.
The director of discipline at Hilton College, David Look, said the school contracts the services of a company using sniffer dogs to conduct searches “to demonstrate the seriousness with which we view the vaping habit and the inherent dangers therein”.
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