This is not a 'we told you so'. For it is rather painful, in the circumstance, to draw attention to a comment in these columns on Monday about what some may have perceived as an attitude of denial by the administration of Kingston Technical High School about a breakdown of discipline at the institution.

Faced with an assault - some say attempted rape - by students on a female teacher, one of KT's vice-principals, Mr. Robert Allen, appeared to downplay the incident.

Apparently having missed the commotion on the campus in the aftermath of the attack, Mr. Allen told a reporter from this newspaper that he knew nothing about it. Later to television interviews, he suggested that the traumatic episode was just part of a 'pocket' of indiscipline. There was also the average stuff as well as "pockets of excellence", Mr. Allen suggested.

What the vice-principal did not say was that that pocket of indiscipline was overwhelmingly large. But perhaps he was unaware.

If that was indeed the case, he may by now be convinced of the magnitude of the problem after yesterday's events at the school. There was a big, bloody brawl between two gangs of 11th grade students.

It seems that at least three students were slashed and stabbed, one so badly that he had to be taken to hospital. The police were summoned to the school and classes were dismissed early.

The incident itself was bad enough, but what, on the face of it was worse, was how it laid bare that total lack of respect and authority enjoyed by the school's administrators. Indeed, one of the injured students was reported to have been grabbed away by the acting principal, Mrs. Powell-Brown.

That Mrs. Powell-Brown witnessed the mob fracas may have been a redeeming feature. Having seen it first hand, there is no denying on her part that it took place, and if she tells Mr. Allen what she saw, we do not expect him to doubt her.

In other words, there can be no denial, no attempt to sweep the big, bald, nasty facts under the carpet: that the school is in trouble and is in need of leadership. This has been so for a long time.

For, as we pointed out Monday, yesterday's incident and last week's assault on the female teacher are not all that happened at KT in recent months. There was the kicking and bottle attack on a male teacher last week by a boy who was caught cheating in a mock exam. There have been the other wounding incidents among students at the school; and there was the case of a teacher who was slapped by an outsider - the community leader, so-called, who feels he has authority on the campus - for having disciplined a student. That teacher took the matter to court.

It is unfortunate that rather than allowing for an open and frank discussion of the problems of Kingston Technical High School, the administrators have been more concerned about preserving reputation and warning teachers about washing proverbial dirty linen in public. Moreover, the school's board of governors has mostly been missing in action.

Hopefully, when the deputy chairman comes this time, he will not be so consumed by a teachers' sit-in to draw attention to the problem. His focus should be on solutions.