Perth teachers leaving profession due to ‘threatening, pushy parents’ says WA Primary Principals Association

A growing number of problem parents who harass or threaten school staff are driving teachers away from the profession — with some school leaders forced to resort to violence restraining orders. The WA Primary Principals Association cited “inappropriate parent behaviour” as one of the key reasons teachers are leaving the workforce in a submission to Education Minister Sue Ellery. The association’s paper on strategies affecting teacher supply, made public to WAPPA members last week, was delivered to Ms Ellery before a crisis meeting held earlier this month on ways to tackle nationwide teacher shortages. The document urged decision-makers to crack down on harassment, threats of violence and actual violence to help retain teachers and raise the status of teaching. “The focus is often put on student violence, but ongoing inappropriate parent behaviour is often the reason teachers walk away,” the paper said. WAPPA president Niel Smith told The West Australian schools were seeing an increase in parents threatening staff or making inappropriate or derogatory comments about teachers or principals on social media. “We’ve had instances this year of verbal abuse and harassment of school leaders on site,” he said. “This year we’ve supported more than one member to look into the potential of a violence restraining order against parents being really threatening, both in person and online.” The submission also suggested pushy parents should be given an avenue to have complaints heard, but there should be a clear strategy under which the complaint was deemed closed. “Provide guidelines around what is reasonable communication with parents and then allow schools to enforce those guidelines,” it said. “Reduce the need for teachers to have to document every interaction with each student and parent in the event it may form the basis of a complaint.” Mr Smith said schools were also seeing parents demanding changes to their child’s grades or complaining about consequences for their poor behaviour. “Just that increasing notion of not really accepting responsibility, and it always impacts on the workload of the classroom teacher or the school leader, taking them away from being able to focus on core business,” he said. Education Ministers who attended the national summit agreed to come up with a nationwide plan to tackle teaching shortages before the end of the year. Ms Ellery said she was also willing to look at additional measures to support positive parental behaviour in schools. “Schools shouldn’t tolerate bad behaviour from anyone, which is why WA public school principals are able to issue Prohibition Orders where appropriate to ban people who are deemed a threat or disruptive from school grounds for up to 60 days,” she said. “In addition to this, last year we established a transparent complaints process and a parent liaison office to support resolution of complaints fr om parents and carers. “We also have communication protocols in place that set out clear expectations for schools on respectful communications between staff, parents and students.”