Minister of Education El-Hilali El-Sherbini was part of Egypt's September cabinet reshuffle (Photo: Al-Ahram)
An Egyptian teacher was summoned to questioning for lashing a fourth-grade primary student 40 times, said Minister of Education and Technical Education El-Hilali El-Sherbini on Saturday, revealing the latest major assault on a student in Egyptian schools.
The ministry said in a statement that the teacher, who works for Kebaa Modern School in Cairo's Basatin district, lashed the student for talking to a peer during class.
The student sustained multiple wounds on different parts of his body. The statement did not reveal what the teacher used to lash the student.
Fourth grade primary students are normally between the ages of 10 and 11.
Corporal punishment, although banned according to education ministry regulations, is common in many Egyptian schools.
According to some studies, cases of abuse are particularly common in Egypt's public schools where teachers are usually underpaid and inadequately supervised.
Last March, the education ministry ordered the temporary closure of Cairo's Al-Shuhada elementary school after a pupil died three days after being brutally beaten by his teacher.
The victim, a fifth-grade student at a public school in the working-class district of Sayeda Zeinab, was transferred to a hospital, unconscious and suffering from brain hemorrhaging, before he was pronounced dead.
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