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Chris Abercrombie: PPTA President on the growing rate of violence in schools · Early Edition with Ryan Bridge

• 0:00
  Speaker 1: So schools are dealing with more fights and assaults than
• 0:02
  Speaker 1: ever before. This year, there have been over twelve thousand
• 0:06
  Speaker 1: incidents of students being stood down, suspended, excluded, or expelled
• 0:10
  Speaker 1: for physical assault on other students and staff. That number
• 0:13
  Speaker 1: has risen forty nine percent in the last six years.
• 0:17
  Speaker 1: PPTA President Chris Abercrombie joins me. Now, good morning, Chris, How.
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  Speaker 2: Are you good morning? Good?
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  Speaker 1: Thank you excellent. How widespread is this issue?
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  Speaker 2: From my understanding, it's pretty widespread from primary to secondary,
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  Speaker 2: and it's a real concern that these numbers are increasing.
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  Speaker 1: The teacher's well trained to handle a violent or difficult
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  Speaker 1: situation like.
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  Speaker 2: This increasingly, so there was an element of restraint restraint
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  Speaker 2: course that teachers had to do. It was online. But
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  Speaker 2: there's a real concern about the significant unmet need in
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  Speaker 2: our schools and this is an expression of that.
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  Speaker 1: What is a significant unnet meat une unmet need?
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  Speaker 2: We know, we know our children are coming to school
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  Speaker 2: with incredibly complex needs, way more complex than when I
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  Speaker 2: was at school, and you know, mental health, bed other issues.
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  Speaker 2: You know were understanding how brains work a lot better.
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  Speaker 2: But we know our schools are under pressure, and this
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  Speaker 2: is an expression of that, thank sure.
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  Speaker 1: And Chris, do we know why there's been an increase
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  Speaker 1: over the last six years of course, which takes us
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  Speaker 1: back to just pre COVID.
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  Speaker 2: Well, I think again there's a unmet need. We know
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  Speaker 2: our populations increased significantly. We know we've got feature shortages,
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  Speaker 2: we know class sizes are increasing. All of these things
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  Speaker 2: just put pressure on the system and you know, and
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  Speaker 2: sometimes unfortunately that pressure shows itself in this way with
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  Speaker 2: these young people.
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  Speaker 1: The government's twenty twenty five budget included seven hundred and
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  Speaker 1: forty seven million boost for learning support, which seems pretty substantial.
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  Speaker 1: Is that going some way to help I mean, does
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  Speaker 1: that get to get more teacher ades and classrooms to
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  Speaker 1: help out?
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  Speaker 2: Well? There for primary, yes, that there will have out
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  Speaker 2: that that was specifically a primary focus. There wasn't much
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  Speaker 2: for secondary in that, and so you know, that's one
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  Speaker 2: of the things the Ministry has said is that this
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  Speaker 2: year's budget, well next year's budget sorry, it is going
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  Speaker 2: to be a secondary teacher focus or a secondary focus.
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  Speaker 2: So we're really hopeful to see that support we need
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  Speaker 2: there because you know, no young person decides they're going
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  Speaker 2: to come along and you know, get into a fight
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  Speaker 2: at school or the teacher or something like that. You know,
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  Speaker 2: there's lots going on in these young people's lives and
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  Speaker 2: sometimes we need to make sure we can support them.
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  Speaker 1: Is that what it's going to take. You need to
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  Speaker 1: have sort of two things on the go here, Maybe
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  Speaker 1: a little bit more support in the classroom with the
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  Speaker 1: teacher aide, and then more better accessibility to you know,
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  Speaker 1: whether it's counselors and psychologists and the people that these
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  Speaker 1: children need to help sort their situations.
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  Speaker 2: Absolutely, absolutely, yeah, particularly that pastoral care support or something
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  Speaker 2: we've been asking well for a long time because we
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  Speaker 2: know this is something that teachers have been saying to us,
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  Speaker 2: is that you know, our young people have really, our
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  Speaker 2: children have really. You know, it's a lot more there's
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  Speaker 2: a lot more complex world than when I was at
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  Speaker 2: school in the eighties and nineties, So you know, young
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  Speaker 2: people are dealing with a lot of issues that a
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  Speaker 2: lot of older people does never never even considered.
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  Speaker 1: To stand down steal with the problem at all.
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  Speaker 2: Yes and no, yes and no. So in a sense,
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  Speaker 2: you know, often it can be a nice catalyst for
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  Speaker 2: a young person. You know, you can get support for them,
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  Speaker 2: you can you know, it can bring about change and some,
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  Speaker 2: but sometimes it's a sort of a cool down period
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  Speaker 2: for everyone involved, and unfortunately too. I mean I grew
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  Speaker 2: up in a small school area and I taught in
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  Speaker 2: single schools and their oly school in the community. Sometimes
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  Speaker 2: that student has to come back to that school. There's
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  Speaker 2: no other choice, there's no other school for them to
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  Speaker 2: go to. So sometimes it's just pausing the problem, but
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  Speaker 2: sometimes it is also a catalyst to get more support.
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  Speaker 1: Chris as always really appreciate your time this morning. Have
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  Speaker 1: a lovely Christmas. Thank you so much. That was PPTA
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  Speaker 1: President Chris Abercrombie.
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  Speaker 2: There for more from Early Edition with Ryan Bridge. Listen
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