Page 4139 - Week 11 - Wednesday, 24 October 2018
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ACT, to ensure that it reduces occupational violence in our schools. Support documents and products for classrooms were also developed and, as a result, more than 2,600 staff have been receiving team teaching training about behaviour management, such as the importance of de-escalation strategies.
Improved accessibility to an online incident reporting system since 2015 has also resulted in increased reporting of incidents. The Education Directorate has worked hard to promote a culture of reporting. This has meant that incidents which have previously gone unreported are now being appropriately reported. This is beneficial to all involved so that appropriate strategies and supports can be put in place and so that the government has better visibility of incident trends.
In December 2016 the Education Directorate formalised its occupational violence safety management system project. This program of work included work, health and safety and due diligence training for all principals by former WorkSafe ACT commissioner Mark McCabe. Approximately $8 million has been spent on addressing occupational violence in schools since 2016, and the government recently committed $2.37 million to fully implement the directorate’s occupational violence policy and management plan.
The work so far has focused on training, strengthening support systems for our staff and enhancing school learning environments. We are seeing a trend that shows that what we are doing is working to increase awareness and is having a positive impact on the health and wellbeing of our staff. Through the undertaking we have acknowledged the significant work that has already been undertaken and have agreed to continue to implement the Education Directorate’s occupational violence policy and management plan; share our experience and learnings with education systems elsewhere, acknowledging that this is a national issue; and work with parents to build safe communities so that they have a shared understanding of the problem and learn how we are working to minimise and respond to violence in schools.
So much is happening in schools to address this important issue. A further four full-time employees and external experts are being engaged to help strengthen the implementation of risk assessments to include a list of reasonable practical steps to eliminate or minimise risk to the safety of individual staff; establish assurance mechanisms so that the controls contained in the relevant risk assessments are adequate; review the mandatory work, health and safety training package and provide role-specific work, health and safety training to teachers and LSAs; strengthen site-specific work, health and safety training based on the site-specific work, health and safety risk assessments; and undertake a whole raft of other work that will directly support workers in our schools, in addition to students in our schools.
In the order of $300,000 will be spent on the enhancement of sensory spaces in schools to support students and manage their behaviours, as well as monitoring incident reporting for trends and reporting monthly to the executive responsible for work, health and safety and the education governance committee on trends and actions.
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