Violence against teachers needs to be addressed

To the credit of the Ontario Nurses’ Association, we are learning much more about the reality of the work environment of nurses. According to the ONA many health-care professionals are revealing that being pushed or spat on or kicked or worse is part of the job.

The ONA is lobbying all levels of government to respond more vigorously to workplace violence.

Yet workplace violence is also endemic to another profession and that is teaching.

Take the recent account of Ottawa high school teacher Tony Lamonica. After 32 years in the teaching profession, he was looking forward to retirement until he ended his career on a hospital stretcher after a violent attack by a student.

Seeking to protect a female student from a physical attack by a 17-year-old male high school student, Lamonica, 59, eventually ended up with a shattered hip and torn rotator cuff after being viciously attacked by the male student. Ottawa police have charged the teenage student with four counts of assault including aggravated assault and assault with a weapon (a chair).

Elsewhere, a Durham District School Board elementary teacher was punched in the head multiple times in one week.

Apparently, some of the children initiating physical violence have been as young as seven or eight years old. In the case of the Durham teacher, she worked in an integrated classroom where students with special needs and those without are in the same class.

Classroom violence involving attacks by students on teachers is not uncommon.

What is puzzling about violence against teachers in our schools is how rarely does the public learn of these attacks by students and now and then even by parents. Why?

My understanding is that both school boards and teachers’ unions endeavour to settle violence issues quietly, ostensibly to protect the child. But what of the teacher?

Hard data is difficult to uncover, although apparently a 2017 survey of Ontario Catholic school teachers found that 60 per cent had experienced some type of violence.

Anticipating that you may be attacked by students is not the reason one enters the noble profession of teaching. Violence in any workplace is simply unacceptable.

Furthermore, regardless of the students’ long-term reputation or the feelings of parents, a child who is responsible for committing violence against a teacher usually should warrant some form of serious discipline or even prosecution.

Workplace violence is broadly defined under Ontario’s Occupational Health and Safety Act.

The definition of workplace violence includes actions that result in physical injury, as well as attempts to cause that injury and threatening statements or behaviours. The source of the violence is a person in the workplace, adult or child.

The victim is a worker, such as a teacher or nurse.

For example, does workplace violence include a student hitting, kicking, spitting, punching or doing worse to a teacher? What are the obligations of a teacher to protect their person or the integrity of other students from a violent attack by a student? And where do parents of violent children come into the picture? Should parents be held liable in civil action?

I am sure that some educators will assure me that charges against students who commit assaults upon teachers would be rare because of the fear of diminishing that student’s future. Yet arguably, a student who is physically violent in a classroom may graduate to more violence on the streets.

If those who serve the public in educational and health-care fields are in more or less constant apprehension of physical violence because there is limited recourse due to school boards keeping a lid on aggressive behaviour and consequent bad publicity, then are professional teachers really protected?

If teachers unions and school boards can quietly work deals to airbrush violence from public discussion and review, what then is the plight of the assaulted teacher?

Who is best served if teachers are assaulted in schools and unions and school administrators such as principals quietly cover up such attacks?

Perhaps it is time for a public discussion.