The Ministry of Education has called on its administrations to crack down on bad behavior at girls' schools, which includes girls imitating men, writing graffiti on school walls, destroying school property and furniture and neglecting their prayers. Behavioral issues now account for 13 percent of all problems at schools for girls. The ministry said officials must set up special counseling programs to deal with this problem, particularly at private schools in the Kingdom. Each education administration will have to determine which types of inappropriate behavior are hindering teaching at schools. This includes excessive use of mobile phones and the Internet, wearing inappropriate and indecent clothes and abayas, cheating in exams, causing chaos, littering, tearing-up and throwing away textbooks, insulting female classmates, and disrupting classes. Officials will also have to check whether the students are disrespecting and beating up female schoolteachers, administrators and students, and are in possession of banned audio cassettes. In another development, the Ministry of Education has urged all its schools to help facilitate the Ministry of Health's vaccination program for measles, German measles and mumps. The vaccination is compulsory and there is no need to secure parents' consent, the ministry said. The program covers all government and private schools for boys and girls. __
