ACT principals report the highest rates of occupational violence in the country and continue to struggle with teacher shortages and sheer quantity of work, new survey results show.
The Australian Principals' Occupational Health and Wellbeing Survey 2023 results show offensive behaviours in Australian schools have reached their highest levels since the survey began.
Nationally, just under half (48.2 per cent) of principals reported being subjected to physical violence and of these people, 96.3 per cent said the violence was caused by students.
But in the ACT, two-thirds of school leaders (65.1 per cent) had experienced physical violence.
Almost three-quarters of principals (72.1 per cent) reported threats of violence in 2023 and more than half (53.5 per cent) experienced conflicts.
Co-lead investigator, Associate Professor Theresa Dicke from the Australian Catholic University, said it was alarming violence had increased by 76.5 per cent since 2011.
She said other caring professions were facing a similar increase in occupational violence.
"It's a big problem in these helping professions, who look after our most vulnerable members in society, such as our youngest, the sick and the eldest, that obviously is quite baffling," she said.
The violence doesn't necessarily mean a principal was attacked - they may have intervened in a brawl between students - and an increase in awareness could have lifted the rates reported in the survey.
ACT Principals' Association co-president Chris Jones said he could not explain why the territory had such high rates of school violence.
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"It doesn't surprise me. I speak to our members, and it's often reported ... for children who are having a bad day, struggling and sometimes threatening violence or kicking out or lashing out at a principal or any member of staff is their way of communicating," Mr Jones said.
"Parents in our communities ... I don't think can use the same excuse that children have and so threats of violence or actual violence from a parent or community members to school staff is just plainly and clearly unacceptable."
The ACU researchers recommended other states look at implementing Victoria's community safety orders, where school principals can place restrictions on people. Mr Jones said he was wary of such mechanisms.
"I think what's more important is around setting the community expectations around: this is how we behave. This is how we interact. This is how we build relationships with each other," he said.
He said ideas had been floated about having allied health services based at schools, similar to the medical centres that used to be attached to ACT public schools from the 1960s to the 1990s.
The survey showed the equal number one issues causing stress for Canberra principals were their immense workload and teacher shortages.
Nationally, staff shortages rated as the sixth biggest source of stress.
"ACT is very staff-focused," Associate Professor Dicke said.
"Up there with the other sources of stress were mental health issues of staff, and then lack of time for teaching and learning and resourcing needs."
Mr Jones said he usually woke up at 5.30am, was at school by 7.30am and didn't leave most days until 4-6pm. He often worked late into the night, including study for his doctorate, and went to sleep at 12.30am. He loved his work but it was exhausting, he said.
"You get these amazing highs and then sometimes you get these amazing lows where you just go, 'I don't know how I'm going to find a teacher for that class today. Or I really want to be able to help a child with some complex needs and their family ... but I'm not quite sure what to do next'," he said.
Catholic Principals Association Canberra and Goulburn Archdiocese president Michael Lee said finding staff was his greatest source of anxiety.
"What does keep me awake is the availability, or the lack of availability, of good teachers," Mr Lee said.
"Having people that are going to be committed to improving their teaching practice in front of students is challenging and just finding anybody is really challenging and I'm one wondering what that's going to look like into the future."
Mr Lee said since the pandemic, anxiety had become more prevalent and the needs of students were more complex.
His own stress as principal at St Mary MacKillop College was reduced by the strong support and shared vision of his colleagues.
Mr Jones said work was being done to reconsider some of the administrative tasks placed on school principals by legislation. He was concerned not enough highly skilled teachers were around to replace leaders about to retire.
"Please don't think we can sustain this forever because we probably can't. And so as a community, we need to be proactive about supporting our schools," Mr Jones said.
