Teacher wellbeing affected by the rise of challenging behaviours
The charity Education Support has published its annual report on teacher wellbeing, collecting data from over 3,000 education staff. The report shows that stress levels remain high at 78%, the same as last year. Similarly, the proportion of staff who report experiencing symptoms of burnout and depression has remained at 35% and 28%. The overall wellbeing score has risen slightly from 43.65 to 43.9, however this remains far below the national average of 51.4.
Almost two thirds of the workforce report that they have experienced more incidents of challenging behaviour from pupils. Additionally, 57% say pupils have also become more disruptive in lessons. 82% say this phenomenon has negatively affected their mental health and wellbeing. They believe pupils’ poor behaviour arises due to a lack of provision for unmet needs, including emotional and mental health, as well as basic needs relating to the cost of living crisis.
Moreover, 43% of staff report that vexatious complaints from parents have increased over the last year. 33% say that parents have become more verbally abusive and 6% say they have become more physically abusive. This has also had a huge impact on staff wellbeing, with 70% reporting that the rise in challenging behaviours from parents has negatively affected their mental health.
Sinéad Mc Brearty, Education Support CEO, says that ‘these issues point to deeper societal problems that extend beyond our schools and colleges.’ The report recommends further investment in public services so that child poverty can be addressed, SEND provision can be properly resourced, and children’s social and mental health services are equipped to mitigate the scale of distress experienced by children and families.
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Multi-agency responses to serious youth violence
This week, Ofsted published a joint report with the Care Quality Commission (CQC), His Majesty’s Inspectorate of Constabulary, Fire and Rescue Services (HMICFRS), and HMI Probation, focusing on children and families affected by serious youth violence. The report reveals that serious youth violence is widespread across England, with children as young as 11 carrying knives because they feel unsafe and feel this is a form of protection.
Whilst any child can be affected by serious youth violence, some groups of children are particularly vulnerable. This includes children with special educational needs or disabilities (SEND). Of the 36 children monitored, inspectors found that only 4 had a disability note in their children’s social care record. However, 16 had a diagnosis of a disability and/or an education, health and care (EHC) plan. A further 15 had additional needs identified and were waiting for assessment. In light of this, the report urges the government to equip local agencies to ensure children have access to timely assessment and appropriate support. Inspectors highlighted examples of strong multi-agency work with education services to ensure children’s needs were met, which helped to reduce children’s risk of serious youth violence and exploitation.
Some children from specific ethnic groups are also disproportionately represented among those harmed by serious youth violence. Inspectors found that some multi-agency partnerships were taking direct action to meet the needs of these groups. For example, commissioning voluntary organisations to provide parenting support, educational interventions, and other resources. However, the report says that more needs to be done at a national and local level to better understand and address disproportionality.
Overall, inspectors found examples of local partnerships doing effective work to reduce harm to children from serious youth violence, but report this is not happening in all areas. In particular, inspectors say that ‘a failure to consistently identify serious youth violence as a safeguarding issue is leaving too many children at serious risk of harm.’ This is exacerbated by a lack of comprehensive guidance from the government on how partners should address harm outside the family. Education was also highlighted as a critical protective factor against serious youth violence and exploitation, as many children monitored in the report were not in full-time education. Inspectors hope these findings will help the Department for Education and Home Office to provide better support for local safeguarding partnerships on this issue.
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Ofsted’s plans to assess schools on 10 areas of performance
This week, in a presentation to education leaders, Ofsted outlined its plans to replace one-word judgements of a school’s overall performance with an assessment against 10 areas of evaluation. The 10 proposed new areas of assessment are: curriculum, teaching, achievement, leadership, behaviour and values, attendance, preparation for next steps, opportunities to thrive, inclusion and belonging, and safeguarding.
The inclusion and belonging assessment would judge the extent to which schools include pupils from socioeconomically disadvantaged backgrounds and those with special educational needs or disabilities (SEND). The plans suggest grading schools in each area with a colour-coded five-point scale, ranging from “exemplary” in purple, to “causing concern” in red. Ofsted argues the new scale would ‘signal a break from the past, not simply rebrand one-word judgements, and remove harmful language like “inadequate”.’
In response to the new proposals, Pepe Di’Iasio, General Secretary of the Association of School and College Leaders, (ASCL), says ‘we are concerned about the apparent direction of travel which seems to us to be over-complicated.’ Ofsted’s final proposals will not be made public until January, when it will launch a public consultation on the new system.
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