Ref: 12824/3LAVINGTON School teacher Liz Greed whose own home was attacked by egg wielding yobs was in the national spotlight this week after she called for an end to the culture of accepted violence among teenagers.

Mrs Greed, 56, of Townsend, Urchfont, who has been a teacher for more than 34 years, made a stirring speech at the annual conference of the Association of Teachers and Lecturers and was later interviewed by national papers, radio stations and appeared on GMTV.

While living in Market Lavington she was frequently the butt of verbal abuse, some of it obscene. On one occasion, about eight to ten years ago, panes of glass in her greenhouse were smashed and chemicals poured over her vegetable plot. She also received abusive phone calls, some of them late at night.

A few years ago she married retired lecturer Peter Greed and the couple settled in nearby Urchfont, but still could not escape the attentions of disgruntled pupils.

One day last year she found the front of her house had been splattered with eggs.

She said: "I collected up all the shells and went around the homes of all my pupils in the village. I finally managed to match the batch number on the egg shells to eggs in the fridge of one of the families.

"When faced with this evidence, the parents were horrified.

"The mother even came round in tears and insisted her child made reparation for the damage. So I got an hour's gardening for free."

She said she has been inundated with messages of support since she condemned the acceptance by education authorities of both physical and mental abuse of members of her profession by pupils and parents.

"In the last ten to 15 years teachers all over the country have had to put up with an increasing amount of abuse. I just spoke from my heart."

But she stressed that her words were not directed at Lavington School, where she teaches English and religious studies, although she admits she has been intimidated by pupils.

Lavington School is by no means a bad one as far as pupils' behaviour is concerned, and in a recent Ofsted report the school was commended for its pupils' behaviour.

Head teacher Martin Watson agreed with Mrs Greed that the problem was a national one and he called on parents to help solve it.

He said: "Children are not all angels and among our 700 here there are one or two who cause problems. But on the whole, our parents support us very well.

"I don't know how much this is looking back wearing rose-tinted spectacles. Teachers have always had some problems with pupils' behaviour.

"Parents could help by not always accepting the child's version of events as the correct one.

"As a profession we want to work together with parents to solve this problem.

"If a child behaves badly at school, the chances are he or she behaves badly at home as well."

Mrs Greed's comments have struck a chord with many people all over the country.

The National Association of Schoolmasters Union of Women Teachers (NASUWT) has advised its members not to live in the areas where they teach, in order to avoid intimidation from pupils. Eamonn Holmes, the presenter on GMTV, told Mrs Greed, following her interview on Tuesday morning, that millions of viewers would be saying "hear, hear" when they heard her comments.

She told the Gazette: "Teachers are being driven from the profession by the vicious attacks on them.

"A colleague of mine in the union was kicked, punched, bitten and had three teeth knocked out by a seven-year-old.

"How much longer are we going to put up with this?

"There needs to be a sea change in public attitudes towards children's behaviour and an end to political correctness which says that children are always right."