An average of more than three cases of sexual crimes were reported daily at schools nationwide between 2013 and 2014, a report revealed this week.
Based on numbers collected from 17 city and provincial education offices, it showed that a total of 2,357 sexual crime cases were reported at elementary, middle and high schools, the report released by New Politics Alliance for Democracy Rep. Bae Jae-jeung said. This translates to an average of 3.2 cases a day, it said.
Sexual molestation cases accounted for 1,182, followed by harassment at 716 and rape at 459.
Most, or 95 percent, of the victims were students, while 3 percent were faculty members and 2 percent outsiders.
The majority of the offenders were also students at 86 percent, followed by faculty (8 percent) and outsiders (7 percent).
Cases where both offender and victim were students reached 1,995, 79 percent of the total cases. Some 105 cases involved faculty members inflicting the crime against students.
Rep. Bae pointed out that the Education Ministry has failed to properly survey the sexual crimes occurring at schools, citing how they have only been tracking numbers without clarifying the types of crimes by identifying the victims and offenders.
“As sex crimes at schools tend to occur in diverse forms, careful measures are needed to deal with the cases according to the type,” Bae said.
