The Decibel - Violence against teachers is surging

Episode Date: September 8, 2026

A growing and worrying trend is happening in Canadian schools – student violence against teachers is on the rise. Data from school boards across Canada supports this finding, with one study finding that the modern-day classroom is a hazardous workplace. But the reasons why violence is more common are complex, and educators, school boards and unions aren’t always in agreement on how to fix it.Dave McGinn, The Globe’s education reporter, joins the show to recount the experiences of teachers who’ve faced assault, the reasons why violence is surging and what ideas are being considered to address a nationwide problem in the education system.Questions? Comments? Ideas? E-mail us at [e-mail] Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

My name is Bridget Healy, and I am a teacher. In 2023, Bridget Healy was teaching grade four in Innesville, Ontario. She had 23 kids in her class. One of her students was diagnosed with autism spectrum disorder and was known by educators to act out. The first day of school, I had scratches all down my arm from his child. The third day of school, he hit me in my chest. so hard that he knocked the wind out of me.

And every single day, there were incidences of screaming, laughing, hitting, scratching. And I can remember one of the children coming up to me after that child was escorted out of my room by an EA after an incidence of violence. And he had said to me, Miss, why is he hurting you? children aren't supposed to hit teachers. They're not supposed to hurt teachers. Why is this happening? And that really opened my eyes to the fact that it's not just myself that is experiencing this and dealing with this.

It's affecting everybody else. The student was not deemed violent enough by administrators to require full-time support. An educational assistant, or EA, had to split time between. between Bridget's classroom and the one next door, which also had a violent student. On the eighth day of school, another incident happened. And he got up from his desk and lunged towards me. She called for help and followed the safety plan for the student,

which was to walk away without acknowledging him. I continued walking away to another student, and then I felt in the back of my head, bam, bam, bam. three times. And then the EA was able to finally rip him off of me. And another EA had heard a disturbance at that time. And so they came in and it took two of them to remove him from the room. Bridget suffered a concussion. It took months before she could return to school. I was diagnosed with PTSD. And I had to work through the incident to be able to work up the

courage to go back into the classroom again and not have fear every time that I turned my back. What happened to Bridget is an extreme case, but student on teacher violence is on the rise across Canada. I think that it's hard right now to be in the education system, no matter what your role is, whether that is a teacher, a student, or a parent. and it's really hard to know that the students with needs are not getting the support that they need because of how long waitlists are. Those students I have extreme empathy for because they're in the fighter flight

and they're being forced into a situation in school where they're not comfortable. Today, my colleague Dave McGinn is on the show. He's the Globe's education reporter. He's going to walk us through this surge in violence, how teachers are feeling, and what provinces and school boards are doing to address it. I'm Cheryl Sutherland, and this is The Decibel from The Globe and Mail. Hi, Dave. Thanks so much for being on the show. Thank you for having me.

So we heard from Bridget Healy in the intro, and what happened to her is, of course, terrible. It's an extreme case of violence. But what are you hearing from other teachers about how common it is for them to experience violence at school from kids? This is a very frequent occurrence. What happened to Bridget Healy is, like you said, a pretty shocking and extreme example. But when you speak to teachers, when you look at surveys of teachers, when you look at studies that have been done, all of it points to violence being a very regular, occurrence in schools across this country. And what kind of violence are we talking about?

We're talking about hitting, spitting, punching, kicking, scratching, beyond physical violence. We're talking about verbal violence of threats or homophobic comments or sexist comments. It really runs the gamut. Okay. So let's talk about what we're seeing across the country. How much of an increase in student violence against teachers are we seeing? So I know we have some members from school boards.

Tell me about that part. So we gather data from school boards from 2018, 2019 school year to the 2024, 2025 school year, just to see how much violence rates have changed from prior to the onset of the pandemic. And the numbers are pretty shocking. The Toronto District School Board, which is the largest school board in the country, saw a 26% increase in violence. And these are all incidents of violence committed by a student against a teacher or staff member. The P.L District School Board, which is the second largest in Ontario, saw a 127% increase.

So in 2024-25, there were more than 7,000 recorded incidents of violence at the P.L. District School Board up from just over 3,100 in the 2018 school year. So it's a significant increase over the past several years. And also in Eminton, there's a huge jump too, right? 161%. 161%. Yes, they recorded 25,783 incidents in the 2024, 24, 2025 school year, up from just 9,883 incidents in 2018. I mean, that number is shocking to me. Huge, huge increase.

And the boards will explain it in several ways to try to make sense of those numbers. And so the data collecting and reporting also needs a bit of analysis to really try to make sense of these trends. Okay. So what do school boards say then? School boards will say the numbers are up for a number of reasons, right? They will say, for one reason, they're encouraging teachers and staff members to report more often. They're also saying that the ways in which numbers are collected can be a bit confusing in that, you know, say there's one incidents where a teacher would be punched three times, such as in the case of Ms. Healy, that might be reported as three acts of violence, even though it's one incidence. And so if we say there are a thousand acts of violence, that might not mean necessarily a thousand different incidents of violence. But I mean, the fact is that the numbers are still going up, right?

So even if an incident is recorded three times, if it's one incident but there's three hits, like from 2018, 2019 to 2024, 2025, the numbers have gone up. Yes, there is a clear trend of the numbers going up and violence becoming a more frequent occurrence. Now, a TDSB spokesperson did say regarding the board's numbers, quote, these numbers represent incidents that have been reported by staff but not yet investigated. and cover a wide range of situations which may or may not have resulted in an injury. It is important to note that some of these incidents include multiple employees reporting the same incident, end quote. Another way to understand this, though, is by looking at short-term and long-term disability claims, right? So tell me about the data there. There again, we see evidence of an increase.

So last year in BC, there were 575 successful short-term and long-term disability claims arising from, quote, an act of violence or force, end quote, filed by secondary elementary and kindergarten teachers and teacher assistants. That's an increase of more than 100 percent since 2018. And in Alberta, there were a 59 percent increase in claims from 2018 through 2024. And we have to remember, these are claims of people having to miss. work because of the violence that they have experienced. And so, therefore, they point to pretty significant injury. How are teachers feeling about this? Teachers are very much at a breaking point.

There was a Canadian Teachers Federation Survey released last year that found 45% of teachers from across the country said they had considered leaving the profession in the last. year and violence and burnout were top concerns for them. They're stressed and tired and when you speak to teachers about this issue, none of them blame the kids. They all say this is a systemic problem. It can't be blamed on kids. It's not that kids are behaving badly. It's that classrooms aren't getting what they need.

What have experts said about this increase in violent incidents? Darcy Santor, who is a professor at the University of Ottawa and has studied workplace violence extensively in regards to schools, released a survey earlier this year that concluded that given the level of violence in schools across Canada, schools should qualify as hazardous workplaces. Wow. Yeah. He was saying that we need to change the way we think. think about schools and school violence. And he said, you know, think about a construction site

where there will often be a sign that says it's been X number of days since we had an incident here, an injury or violence, right? It's been 80 days since there was an accident. There's been 100 days since there was an accident. He said, if you were to have that sign at any school in Canada about how many days there's been since there was violence, the number would always be zero. Wow. Yeah. His survey of 4,000 education workers across Canada found that 78% of them experienced at least one act, attempt, or threat of physical violence, while 26% of them reported PTSD-like symptoms. And you know, another thing to think about is that violent incidents against a teacher do have ripple effects in the classroom, right? Like, what have you heard on that front?

Yeah, when there is a violent incident in the classroom, it's not just limited to the student who is doing it and the teacher who is the victim of it. There are other kids in the room. And the head of the Nova Scotia Teachers Union told me that there are students in the province who are showing signs of PTSD because they have been in the room. witnessed violence. Wow. Yeah. I mean, there's classrooms being evacuated. There are kids seeing their teachers get hit or punched or yelled at.

And how could it not affect kids in the room? We'll be right back. Okay, so we've laid out the numbers and how experts, educators, and school boards are feeling about it. I want to understand what's behind it. So why is violence on the rise? There are a few different reasons for it. So one is that teachers will tell you kids have a much harder time self-regulating now than they did before.

And that might be for several reasons. One is that kids might be dealing with mental health issues or other needs that are not being diagnosed. There is also what seems to be a real lack of funding. to give kids the supports that they need. And then there is this issue of the model of inclusive education that disability advocates say is not being applied in the way that it should be. Okay, let's go through these three points that you mentioned,

more in depth here. So let's start with self-regulation and how kids are acting now. How is that contributing to the rise in violence? There are kids, and, you know, teachers will tell, you this, educational assistance will tell you this, disability advocates will tell you this, that classrooms are highly complex now because there are kids who are struggling to regulate themselves emotionally. And it could very well be and likely is in many instances because kids

have issues that are not being diagnosed and treated. Right. So right now under the Ontario autism program, the weight in many parts, or at least some parts of the province to even be diagnosed, can be up to three years. Wow. That's a long time. That's a long time. And when we say complex classrooms, like, what does that mean? Is it just mean there's a bunch of different kids with different needs in the class?

Yeah. Yeah. The complexity of a classroom is a matter of the composition of the classroom, right? So if you have 25 kids in your class who are all able to sit crisscross applesauce and pay attention and learn, that's a different situation than kids who, you know, with 25 kids who five of them might have autism, three have ADHD, two of them are English as a second language students. And so it's really about the learning needs and challenges of a classroom and what students may or may not be dealing with. That's what we're talking about when we talk about complexity.

Okay. And can you just connect the dots for me? Like, why is it that a more complex classroom is leading to violence? Like, what's happening there? Well, again, you know, teachers, unions, and disability advocates will say this is where funding comes in, right? Because kids are not getting the supports that they need. Last year during the Alberta Teacher Strike, the Alberta's Teachers Association, the union that represents teachers in the province, had been pushing for a model where supports would

be granted based on the complexity of a classroom, right? So let's say a teacher had, just hypothetically, had, you know, five kids with complex needs. That would mean that they would have an EA assigned to them or other supports, right? Like that we could look at a class and say, this isn't simply a matter of how many students you have in a classroom, but what kinds of students you have in a classroom. And based on what kinds of students you have in a classroom, you would be granted certain supports to help those kids. I think a lot of teachers, teachers unions, and again, disability advocates will say, we have very complex classrooms now, but kids aren't getting the supports they need, whether it's, you know, school psychologists or school nurses or screening or EAs. And this is creating

conditions where kids are almost inevitably going to act out. Let's get into the second thing that you brought up, which is this issue of funding for special education. Can you explain what's going on there? So when you look at spec ed funding, again, you will hear from a lot of teachers and teachers unions and disability advocates that there just isn't enough money in the system to address the needs of students. An auditor general report in Ontario came out earlier this year that seems to support that conclusion. It found that of Ontario 72 school boards, 46 of them collectively spent $397.9 million more than they received in special education funding in the 2023, 2024 school year. So that means boards are pulling that money from other programs to deal with that issue.

And so it would seem, at least amongst those 46 boards, that there is a fairly drastic underfunding of special education. Okay. So, yeah, there's funding coming from the Ontario government, but it's just not enough. It's just not enough. Is this happening in other provinces? Like, do we have any numbers for other places in Canada? Yeah. British Columbia is experiencing much the same thing.

They've increased their funding by 8.9%. But their two, disability advocates will say, when you look at the rise in the student population and the rise in students with special needs, that funding is just insufficient to deal with those increases. So education assistants play a role in special education, right? And we learned this from Bridget's story that this EA in her case was very important to her in this other classroom. What do EAs do and how have they said things have changed for them? So an educational assistant's job is to help students with needs to address their, you know, help them with their academics, help them with their social and emotional and physical needs throughout the day.

So they perform a very important role in the day-to-day school lives of kids with special needs. But if when you speak to many of them, they will tell you that their job now is just running from one fire to them. another. Okay, so less of this role of helping a child through their academics and more dealing with... More just running to help deal with emergency situations. So not even able to help kids with their schoolwork anymore, but just trying to resolve and contain really dramatic situations. That sounds really stressful. And from speaking to people in education, it sounds like it is harder and harder to find EAs because it's really difficult work. It can be very stressful work.

A lot of them are wearing Kevlar all day long. What's Kevlar? Kevlar is what police forces use to as like bulletproof vests. Oh my gosh. Yeah, the Kevlar gloves, Kevlar shin pads. And it's not a very well-paying job. And so what number of EAs are out there, you know, they're very dedicated to their work, but I think fewer and fewer people are taking up the profession because of just how

challenging it can be these days. The final thing you mentioned was the inclusion model of education and how that may be contributing to more violence. Can you explain what that is and why some are arguing that it's part of the issue? Yeah, the inclusion model is a really interesting factor in all this. So over the past few decades, school boards across the country have been, I'm adopting a model of inclusive education. And what that essentially means is that instead of having rooms specific to spec ed learners,

we should take those kids and integrate them into mainstream classrooms so that they're not, there is no stigma. Yeah. There is no otherizing of these kids. And everyone agrees that in principle, that's a fine idea. The problem, many say, is that while we are moving spec ed learn, into mainstream classrooms, we are not providing them the supports that they need, right? So we're putting a kid in that room, but we're not bringing an EA for them.

We're not, we don't have the school psychologist for them or whatever supports those kids might need in order to do well in that classroom. And the line that is frequently repeated by disability advocates is that inclusion without supports is neglect. What do families and educators, what do they say about this? How do they feel about this model? I think that there are some people who are beginning to rethink inclusion, broadly speaking, right? I think there are people who say it shouldn't just be one or the other.

We shouldn't just move entirely to inclusive education because there might be some kids who do fare better under other circumstances in other rooms with specialized supports. And there are many kids who will do well in mainstream classrooms, given the supports that they need. And so teachers and families are saying, you know, if we are going to adopt inclusion, let's do it in a more thoughtful way that pays attention to the more nuanced needs of kids and what will actually help them. And, you know, when we are putting kids in mainstream classrooms, let's make sure that they have the supports that they need. Let's talk about what's being done to address this, at least in some parts. of the country. So Ontario, they're addressing this by putting more police in schools, right? Why is Ontario taking this approach? And what does that look like, too? Yes. So as of this school year, Ontario has mandated that wherever a police force operates

a, they're called school resource officer programs, SRO. Wherever a police force operates an SRO, a school board is obliged to participate in it. So a lot of times it means very different things, right? An officer will be assigned to a school. They might be there all every day of the week. They might be there some days of the week. They're frequently coaching sports teams. They will sometimes teach lessons in class.

And in Ontario's eyes, they're going to make schools safer. They're going to make schools more secure. They will help students develop a better relationship with law enforcement. but there are people who say when there is an act of violence at a school, a police officer there will only be responding to a crisis after the fact. And what we should be doing is providing these kids the supports that they need so that a crisis never happens in the first place. And I understand there's also criticisms about how police might deal with indigenous kids and black kids, right? Yes. So especially following the death of George Floyd, there was a real reckoning of SRO programs across Canada in the United States as well, too, because one of the main concerns about them has always been that they will make black and indigenous students uncomfortable or feeling as if they are being targeted throughout the school day.

What are teachers and other experts looking for here to deal with these issues? They want more supports. They want more EAs. They want more school psychologists. They want more screening and more screening earlier for kids. And, you know, again, looking back to what the Alberta Teachers Association was looking for last year is one example of how. teachers think this could be better addressed, right? By examining the composition of a classroom and allocating resources accordingly.

In Ontario, the teachers' unions are bargaining with the province this fall for new collective agreements. So it'll be really interesting to see what proposals they bring to the table. Broadly speaking, it's a matter of we need more money and more supports. So Dave, what you've laid out today, it seems like it's a a very difficult situation for teachers that are in schools right now. So where does that leave people like Ms. Healy, for example? Like, how is she doing? She's doing okay. I asked her if what she has experienced has ever made her want to leave teaching. And she told me she's never thought about quitting,

but it does make her think about how long she can last. in a system that is like this? I feel as though working with children is my calling. I am very passionate about that. Right now I'm taking the time and the space that I need. I'm going back to school. I'm trying to improve my practice. I know that my future will contain education in some way.

I'm just not too sure what that will look like. I just don't know if the traditional school setting is sustainable for me. And I'm assuming that she's not alone with that thought. No, no. There are a lot of teachers you will speak to who will tell you, I just got to get to retirement age. I just got to get to where I can qualify for my pension and then I'm out the door. Not a happy note to end on here,

but it's an important thing that we talk about this. So, Dave, thank you so much for coming on the show and talking about this. Thank you for having me. That was Dave McGinn, the Globe's Education Reporter. That's all for today. I'm Cheryl Sutherland. Our producers are Madeline White, Rachel Levy McLaughlin and Mahal Stein. Our editor is David Crosby.

Adrian Chung is our senior producer, and Angela Pichenza is our executive editor. Thanks so much for listening. Thank you.