Pupil behaviour ranks highly as a concern among teachers in Scotland, although we are clear that this is not a new phenomenon.
In 2019, pre-pandemic, the NASUWT teaching union survey evidence suggested that more than one in 10 of our members had suffered a physical assault in the course of their work in the preceding 12 months.
What is new, however, is the increasing scale and extent of the problem.
In our Scottish behaviour survey published last month, 93 per cent of the 358 respondents said the number of pupils exhibiting physically violent and abusive behaviours had increased in the past 12 months, with nearly four in 10 reporting violence or physical abuse from pupils, including being spat at, head-butted, punched and kicked and having furniture, including chairs, thrown at them.
Some 94 per cent reported receiving verbal abuse, including being sworn at, threatened with serious violence (even the threat of being shot) and targeted with racial or sexual insults.
Alongside physical and verbal abuse, teachers report widespread “lower-level” challenges to school rules or the authority of teachers, such as pupils arriving late to lessons, refusing to put away mobile phones during class or sometimes just failing to turn up and wandering the corridors instead.
We cannot ignore the impact of the pandemic. Indeed, the lack of reliable research evidence has been repeatedly highlighted to MSPs during parliamentary evidence. Teachers, however, need more than research and inquiry.
Education secretary Jenny Gilruth’s acknowledgement that there is a significant problem was an important first step, alongside the instigation of a “national summit” to explore pupil behaviour and its impact on teachers and learners. The first meeting this month focused on recording and monitoring incidents, and all parties unanimously agreed that there is no shared understanding of what should be reported and how, either locally or nationally.
Recognising the problem is important, but teachers are navigating pupil behaviour challenges now and they need action and support from their employers and the government.
The NASUWT is taking a lead role nationally, making a number of suggestions for action that could be implemented without delay:
- Strengthen national guidance on behaviour management to ensure there is clear messaging on the unacceptability of violent and abusive behaviour and confirm that appropriate consequences for inappropriate behaviour should be applied, including pupil exclusion where absolutely necessary.
- Ensure that all schools have a behaviour management policy based on this national guidance, which has been discussed and agreed with staff.
- Where restorative behaviour approaches are used as part of behaviour policies, these are also agreed with staff and, rather than being seen in isolation, are part of a wider suite of behaviour management approaches, which include the ability to escalate to senior management and the possibility of more serious consequences.
- Establish a consistent system for monitoring, recording and responding to incidents of abuse and violence in schools.
- Ensure that systems of appropriate support for staff are available, including targeted support for staff who have experienced abuse or violence.
- Commission independent research on the causes of poor behaviour in schools, including any specific pandemic-related issues.
- Develop a wide-ranging programme of professional development opportunities on behaviour management for school staff, which reflects the various successful approaches to this being used (in Scotland and elsewhere).
- Ensure that Education Scotland and its school inspectors give appropriate support on behaviour management to schools and teachers.
- Provide clear guidance on the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child (UNCRC) when adopted into Scots law, especially on what schools should do when the rights of different children conflict with each other.
- Recognise that schools alone cannot address all the reasons for poor pupil behaviour and take broader actions that will help schools: such as ensuring that every school across Scotland has access to a school-based counsellor and expanding the provision of free school meals in Scotland to all pupils.
Teachers need to see significant and long-term change, with a sustained reduction in poor pupil behaviour and better protection for teachers from violence and abuse.
A failure to tackle violence and abuse in schools today will have long-lasting consequences for teacher recruitment and retention - and for the education of children and young people
Mike Corbett is Scotland’s national officer for the NASUWT teaching union and worked for many years as a teacher of English
