Nova Scotia school support staff want a say in addressing school violence

CITYnews halifax / By Keith Doucette, The Canadian Press

HALIFAX — Unionized support workers in Nova Scotia’s public schools are pushing for improvements to deal with rising school violence, weeks before students are to return to the classroom.

During a news conference in front of Halifax City Hall on Thursday, the Canadian Union of Public Employees announced an online petition and released a 13-page report on the violence affecting its membership.

The petition calls for public support in convincing provincial officials to include support staff in the development of strategies to address the problem, while the union report echoes many of the findings made by provincial auditor general Kim Adair in a June report on school violence.

Nan McFadgen, president of CUPE Nova Scotia, said the province’s 5,000 support workers end up dealing with most violent incidents in schools and they want a say in addressing the problem. The union said despite promises of consultation over the summer, it has not heard from provincial education officials.

“We are ready for the conversation and we are ready to be part of the solution,” McFadgen said.

Adair documented an increase in violent incidents in schools to 27,000 from 17,000 over the past seven years. If the trend continues, the union estimates the number of incidents could reach nearly 35,000 during the upcoming school year, McFadgen said.

However, similar to the auditor general’s findings, the CUPE report says the actual extent of the problem is unknown due to under-reporting and a lack of data collection.

“As shocking as it may seem, no one actually knows exactly how many violent incidents are happening in our public schools, by students, in front of students and against school support staff,” says the report.

According to a survey by the union, 43 per cent of support staff said they didn’t feel their employer was doing enough to prevent workplace violence, while 50 per cent said they received no response when they reported violent incidents.

Meanwhile, 65 per cent of school support staff said they had witnessed or experienced violence in schools on a weekly basis, with 31 per cent saying they had experienced violence daily — a number that jumped to 52 per cent among teaching assistants.

Shelley McNeil, president of the union’s Halifax-area local and a school child and youth-care practitioner, said many of her co-workers are apprehensive about their return to school.

“They are very supportive and they love their students, but of course there’s a fear there,” McNeil said. “My school has so many needs of students but lacks the front-line workers.”

The union recommends several steps to address violence in schools including higher wages and benefits for support staff and improved training in areas such as non-violent crisis intervention. It also says school support staff should be given access to an online reporting tool to report incidents, and that there needs to be improved data collection and analysis by the province.

After the release of the auditor general’s report, Education Minister Becky Druhan said she was committed to a review of the code of conduct in schools, adding that she has asked teachers to commit to recording every violent incident. Druhan’s department has also promised to implement the recommendations in Adair’s report by the start of the 2025 school year.

Krista Higdon, an Education Department spokeswoman, said in an email Thursday that a draft of the updated code of conduct will be ready for consultation this fall.

“We are reviewing the report shared today and the minister looks forward to continued collaboration on this important work,” Higdon said.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Aug. 15, 2024.

Keith Doucette, The Canadian Press