There are few institutions we trust as instinctively as schools. For most children, school is where life unfolds in a structured way. It is where they learn, grow, make friends and slowly begin to understand the world. It is also where parents place a deep and tacit trust: that their children are not only being educated, but cared for and kept safe.
That trust has to be earned. Because while schools are often safe spaces, they are not automatically safe systems. And when it comes to child protection, that difference matters enormously.
Schools hold a position unlike almost any other institution. They are one of the few environments where children spend consistent, structured time with adults outside their families, which means they carry a possibility that is easy to underestimate, becoming the first real point of awareness, safety and support in a child's life. For many children, a teacher is the first adult they learn to trust beyond home. And a classroom can be where they begin to understand their rights, recognize boundaries or find the language to express discomfort.
That potential, however, only becomes real when systems manifest it.
The numbers around child safety in Nepal make this urgent. According to UNICEF, violent discipline affects 82 percent of children between the ages of one and fourteen, with almost every child experiencing some form of it within their own home. A nationally representative study drawing on data from over 13,000 households found that one in every two children in Nepal is subject to corporal punishment. Furthermore, a cross-sectional study across 20 randomly selected schools in Kathmandu found that nearly 89 percent of students had experienced at least one form of abuse in their lifetime.These are not fringe cases. They represent the reality of childhood for many in Nepal.
Yet what stands out even more than the scale is how rarely it surfaces. The United States Department of State’s 2023 Human Rights Report on Nepal noted that while violence against children, including sexual abuse, was reportedly widespread, no reliable estimates of incidence existed, in part because reporting remains deeply inconsistent. Some cases surface. But many more do not.
I have seen this silence take a particular shape: a child speaks up, a school prepares to act, and then a family member intervenes and the case disappears. There is no report, no follow-up and no protection for the child. In a survey conducted in Nepal among 370 healthcare providers, although 87 percent showed positive attitudes toward child protection, only 13.5 percent were found to have ever reported any suspected incident of abuse. If trained individuals who are professionally involved in dealing with vulnerable children are reluctant to report, it is not difficult to understand how cases within schools and families quietly vanish.
The problem, however, is not always indifference. It is the absence of a system that makes reporting the default, rather than a choice that can be overridden by fear, loyalty or social pressure.
Child safety cannot depend on individual judgment alone. When something concerning happens, the response cannot rest on personal discretion or informal decisions about what feels serious enough to act on. There has to be a clear expectation that concerns are reported without hesitation and without negotiation. When reporting becomes standard practice across teachers, school leaders, caregivers and all staff working closely with children, it removes ambiguity and the burden of isolated decision-making. Most importantly, it keeps the focus to where it belongs: on the child.
Additionally, child protection systems need clear, fast and accessible pathways for response. When processes are slow or unclear, harm is prolonged. According to UNICEF, although responses in Nepal are present, they are often ad hoc, short-term and far from being adequate for proper case management.
There is also the question of who is allowed to work with children in the first place. Working with children demands both trust and verification, and this applies not only to teachers, but to school staff, transport personnel, coaches, and professionals in healthcare and other sectors where children are regularly under adult care. Periodic criminal record checks and child protection clearances are one part of this.
Another critical step is mandatory certification on child safety laws, protection procedures and reporting responsibilities so that every adult in a child-facing role knows not just that safety matters, but exactly what to do when it is threatened. When violations occur, consequences must be clear and consistent, including the revocation of the right to work with minors. These measures are not extreme. They are the minimum requirement for ensuring systems that serve children.
None of this works unless children and families are a part of it. Children need to understand, in age-appropriate ways, what safe and unsafe behaviour looks like, what their rights are, and that speaking up will not make things worse. Families, too, need to be part of this awareness, so that when a child speaks up, the response is one of support rather than silence or an attempt to contain it.
Teachers sit at the centre of all of this. Not because they carry sole responsibility, but simply because the teacher interacts with the child on a regular basis. A teacher who listens without dismissal, who notices without ignoring, can change everything by giving the child that support they need. In most cases, it is not a system a child turns to first. It is a person who makes them feel safe and understood.
Nepal’s Constitution states that no child shall be subjected to physical, mental, or any other form of torture at home, school, or any other place. These words are unambiguous. But words do not protect children: people and systems do. And right now, too many children in Nepal are navigating harm in silence, in spaces that should be among the safest they know. That can change.
It changes when schools are reimagined not only as places of learning, but as spaces of protection. It changes when reporting becomes reflex rather than choice, and when every adult working with children understands that their responsibility does not end at the classroom door. Then, safety will not be something children have to hope for. It becomes something they can rely on.
