School yard bullying of teachers needs to stop

An article in today's Herald-Sun has revealed that more than $21 million was paid to teachers in stress leave between January 2002 and August 2006. WorkCover figures suggest that around 700 state school teachers have been paid to take stress leave due to harassment, assault and work pressures.

Disturbingly, violence and harassment of school teachers seems to be on the rise, whilst the students doing the bullying seem to be getting younger. The article provides an example of a primary school student that threatened a teacher with a knife after the student was told to move into the shade because he was not wearing a hat.

This fast becoming a major OH&S workplace safety issue. Violence and harassment should not be something a teacher is forced to deal with, and this trend needs to be stamped out quickly, or else teaching, as a profession, is going to seem less and less attractive for people considering teaching as a career.

What is the worst example of violence or harassment that you have experienced first hand?

Post sponsored by: Outer Banks.

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