Ontario education workers, NDP call on government to stop violence in schools

Ontario education workers and the opposition NDP are calling on the Ford government to address growing violence in the Ontario’s schools.

A survey done for the Elementary Teachers' Federation of Ontario (ETFO) last year found 77 per cent of union members had either experienced or witnessed violence.

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Educational assistant Monica Melo-Manhsinh says the number of incidents have climbed over the last eight years, and the problems have deepened since the COVID-19 pandemic.

"I have been kicked, punched, spit on, pushed into objects, had objects such as pieces of furniture thrown at me, bit, and in recent years, I've even been lifted off the ground by my neck," Melo-Manhsinh told reporters at Queen's Park Tuesday.

She says the damage to herself and her colleagues is physical, mental, and sometimes life-altering, taking surgery to repair. Once part of a team of nine, Melo-Manhsinh says budget cuts have reduced that number to just two.

New Democrats are urging the government to set up what they have dubbed an "Emergency Safe Schools Plan" that includes:

Hiring more staff including mental health workers, educational assistants and child and youth workers

• Funding for training
• A permanent working group on education sector violence
• A province-wide reporting system for incidents of violence
• An education sector regulation in the Occupational Health and Safety Act

NDP Education Critic Chandra Pasma says her party will move a motion, asking the government to adopt those changes when the legislature reconvenes next month.

She explains that the reduction in staff has meant educators aren't getting the one-on-one time with students they used to.

"They would know the triggers. They would see the student becoming agitated. They would be able to intervene to get the child out of that situation, or to take a body break to calm them down," Pasma said.

Schools are also seeing "spillover" from challenges away from school grounds. On Monday, a teenage boy was grazed in the head by a bullet in the parking lot of a Scarborough high school.

Pasma says a lack of access to youth programming, recreation programs, employment, and autism therapies are part of the problem.

"When there's no support in the community, no support in the health care system, then the school becomes the only form of support. And so these kids are becoming frustrated because the teachers, the education workers, the mental health professionals, child and youth workers, they don't have the time and the capacity to deal with every single problem that's not being dealt with outside the school," she said.

In a statement to CTV News Toronto, a spokersperson for the Ministry of Education said students and staff members "deserve to be safe and learn in positive school environments."

"For the 2024/25 school year we’ve provided school boards with $29 billion in education funding that includes $123 million to support schools in the implementation of programs, and initiatives on student safety, as well as critical safety infrastructure funding for security upgrades. Since 2018, we’ve increased student mental health supports by 577% and added an additional 900 education workers across the province. We have and we will continue to increase funding in education every single year of our mandate," the spokesperson noted.