The Briefing
- President Keiko Fujimori on Monday presented Peru's first national school discipline framework, organizing student misconduct into three severity tiers — minor, serious, and very serious — with proportional consequences for each level.
- The guidelines take effect across all of Peru's public and private schools; sanctions may include temporary removal or expulsion, but no measure may result in a student permanently leaving the education system.
- The move comes after Peru's PISA 2025 scores fell to decade-low levels — 382 in mathematics and 390 in reading — and forms one pillar of a broader National Education Plan 2026–2031 that calls for 2,000 new schools.
Peru's government unveiled a sweeping school discipline policy on Monday as President Keiko Fujimori officially presented the framework at the Felipe Santiago Estenos school in Lima's Chaclacayo district, flanked by Education Minister José Antonio Chang. The venue was deliberate: by holding the launch inside an actual school rather than a government building, the administration underscored that this policy is meant to reach classrooms, not just regulations.
The regulations — formally called the Lineamientos para la Gestión de la Disciplina Escolar — establish clear rules, transparent procedures, and proportional measures designed to make Peru's schools safer and more respectful environments for both teachers and students.
The Crisis Behind the Reform
The policy arrives at a low point for Peruvian education. PISA 2025 results placed Peru 382 points in mathematics and 390 in reading — ranking the country in the bottom quarter of 91 nations assessed and erasing more than a decade of gradual progress. The Fujimori administration has drawn an explicit line between disorderly classroom environments and these academic setbacks.
Three Tiers of Misconduct, Proportional Consequences
Under the new framework, student behavior violations fall into three bands: minor, serious, and very serious. Each tier triggers a proportional response. At the most extreme end, a student may be temporarily removed from the school — or, under the gravest circumstances, expelled from the institution entirely.
A built-in safeguard separates this approach from purely punitive models: under no circumstances may any disciplinary action cause a student to exit the education system altogether. Fujimori and Minister Chang outlined reinsertion alternatives — reintegration schools, hybrid classroom settings, community learning centers, and psychological counseling — to ensure that students removed from one institution remain inside the system.
No Expulsion Without a Safety Net
The mandatory reinsertion guarantee may be the most consequential element of the entire policy. A student separated from the environment where disruption occurred does not forfeit the right to an education; the state takes on a binding obligation to keep that student enrolled somewhere. Similar frameworks have produced mixed outcomes across Latin America, and the model's success in Peru will depend largely on whether the physical and human infrastructure for these alternatives is actually available nationwide.
The guidelines distribute explicit responsibilities across the school system: principals, teachers, families, Local Educational Management Units (UGELs), and regional education directorates each take on specific duties within the framework. Peruvian educators have spent years confronting student misconduct without adequate institutional backup or clear protocols; the new policy closes that gap by assigning accountability at every level — from the classroom to the regional office.
Third Pillar of a Larger Education Plan
The discipline guidelines do not stand on their own. They are one component of the National Education Plan 2026–2031, which also calls for the construction of 2,000 new schools at a pace of 500 per year and the renovation of 3,000 existing facilities. In September, the government announced a curriculum overhaul focused on reading comprehension, mathematical reasoning, and civic education, while removing content it characterized as ideologically driven. Classroom discipline now completes the plan's three-pronged approach: infrastructure, curriculum, and school conduct.
Schools Have Limited Time to Comply
The government indicated that educational institutions will be given a defined window to update their internal governance documents once the guidelines receive official ratification — though the exact deadline had not been published at the time of this report. Whether the framework succeeds in transforming day-to-day life in Peru's classrooms is a question that will take months or years to answer. What is no longer in doubt is that teacher authority now has a formal name, a defined procedure, and an official mandate.
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