I’ve been lucky. I’ve enjoyed a rewarding career in education, including almost 15 years as a principal in the Northern Territory and the ACT. I’ve worked with wonderful teachers and administrative staff, and shared in the successes of hundreds of young people and their families as they grow and graduate high school, going on to further study, employment and life adventures.

I’ve also experienced verbal and physical abuse, aggression and violence from students and their carers, directed at me and my colleagues in the course of my work as a school leader. I once regarded these occasional events as part of the job, normal in our frontline occupation. I now think we have grown complacent about the levels of violence toward a predominantly female workforce that we would not tolerate in other workplaces. As the latest data from the Australian Catholic University’s (ACU) annual Principal Health, Safety and Wellbeing report, released this week, shows, things are getting worse for my profession.

Our children and young people are learning to understand themselves and their place in the world, sometimes leading to conflict and inappropriate behaviour. Some students have needs that our schools are not set up to support. I’ve been sworn at and called all manner of offensive names,........

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