Student violence becomes the new normal in Ontario as teachers look for solutions

As instances of student violence in Ontario schools skyrocket, teachers are searching for solutions to keep both students and faculty safe.

The Ontario Secondary School Teachers’ Federation hosted the Safe at School Summit this week.

The event functioned as a major gathering of educators, children’s mental health experts and school board directors who were brought together to address what has been deemed an ongoing crisis — student violence.

Violent occurrences have been recently popping up in Ontario schools, such as last year, when an 11-year-old girl was allegedly chased into a bathroom and attacked by three other students in Durham Region public school.

According to OSSTF researchers, aggravated disruptions in school grounds are not localized to student-on-student incidents, as the organization found that from 2022 to 2023, three in 10 teachers were subject to student violence in Ontario.

“I don’t think any kids are inherently violent, but they are trying to communicate that their needs haven’t been met and they are expressing themselves and acting out. It is violence that is actively happening but they aren’t violent to their core,” OSSTF president Karen Littlewood told INsauga.com.

During the summit, Littlewood and mental health professionals studied collective research gathered by the OSSTF to develop a conclusive action plan to manage violent incidents in Ontario schools.

Several proposals were drafted that called on the provincial government’s immediate intervention.

These included mandating a provincewide school safety action plan, ensuring sector-specific regulations be drafted for educators under the Occupational Health and Safety Act and mass hiring incentives for on-site mental health support workers across Ontario schools.

Support personnel have operated in Ontario schools for some time, however according to Littlewood, they remain stretched thin, leading to a major staffing crisis that forces teachers to play double duty as educators and crisis intervention staff.

“Mental health workers and child care workers are split between multiple sites and are dealing with multiple crises. As a result, you are left with a teacher saying, ‘I’ll do my best, but I’m not a mental health worker,” says Littlewood.

As for the root of student violence, Littlewood noted that the causes are as complex as the students themselves, citing active trauma in households, lingering issues from pandemic-era remote learning, and a lack of repercussions at home and school.

“One of our psychologists on one of our panels at the summit said that there is a lack of natural consequences, which has been taken away. We are guilty of bubble-wrapping our children,” says Littlewood.

While the issue of student violence cannot be remedied overnight, Littlewood and Ontario educators believe the best way to combat this issue is to better fortify for the future.

A key finding at the Safe at School Summit — beyond emergency funding for schools — was the proposition for a tuition waiver to attract university-aged students into public education programs hemorrhaging staff.

This, in turn, will provide a potential groundwork for newly trained faculty, be they teachers or mental health professionals, to address the ongoing crisis surrounding student violence as it cascades into the future.

Until such measures are implemented, Littlewood continues to fear the worst, as student violence is already becoming so common, that it is on the brink of becoming the new standard for schools in Ontario.

“What we don’t talk about at all, is the impact it is having on the kids in a classroom, who are witnessing this, and as a result, are normalizing it. They’re not going home and talking to their parents about it. They have gotten so used to a whole classroom evacuating because of it, and that’s just not normal — it shouldn’t be the state of affairs in Ontario,” she says.

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