Aggression towards teachers and principals is being normalised as something to manage, rather than treated as a workplace hazard employers must prevent.

The message reaches the staffroom late in the afternoon: an angry parent is on the way. A teacher has already endured an abusive telephone call. The principal prepares to meet the parent, quietly ensuring another staff member will be nearby. Nobody calls this an emergency. It is simply something to be ‘managed’.

Across Australian schools, teachers and principals are shouted at, threatened, intimidated, publicly vilified and sometimes assaulted. Conduct that would trigger an immediate safety response in many workplaces is instead absorbed into the job. Staff are expected to remain calm, repair the relationship and continue working.

When did exposure to aggression become an occupational expectation – and why is a known hazard treated as a problem of resilience rather than prevention?

The strongest evidence is the Australian Principal Occupational Health, Safety and Wellbeing Survey, which has tracked school leaders since 2011. In 2025, 47.8 per cent of respondents reported physical violence at work, up from 27.3 per cent in 2011. Threats rose from 37.9 to 53.7 per cent, while 87.2 per cent reported some form of offensive behaviour. Students remain responsible for most physical assaults, but parents and caregivers were identified as the source of almost two-thirds of threats and nearly nine in ten cases of cyberbullying.

National evidence for classroom teachers is less complete. An exploratory 2018 La Trobe University survey of 560 teachers found that more than 70 per cent had experienced bullying or harassment by a student in the previous year and almost 60 per cent from parents. Its social-media recruitment means the results cannot represent every teacher, and it predates the recent rise in the longitudinal principal data. The studies differ in method and coverage, but together indicate that........

© Pearls and Irritations