Issues
School leaders battle work stress and violence By Minh Lam
Nearly a third of school leaders – a record number – face stress and burnout from their jobs as they battle high levels of threats and physical violence from parents and students, an annual school leader well-being survey has found. The Australian Principal Occupational Health, Safety and Wellbeing Survey 2019 has revealed school leaders are also increasingly concerned for the mental health of their staff and students, more so over the past 12 months than any other year. But the researchers behind the report, from the Australian Catholic University (ACU) and Deakin University, believe the disruptions to school and home lives due to COVID-19, could have a beneficial effect in raising the awareness and appreciation in the community towards the challenges facing school leaders. It recommends that employers should reduce job demands and/or increase resources for staff, while the community needs to promote social capital to stop offensive and violent behaviour towards educators. The report surveyed almost 2,400 school leaders from across the country in all education sectors, and has been running since 2011, with more than half of the nation’s school leaders participating during that time. The project was led by Professor Herb Marsh and his team from the ACU’s Institute for Positive Psychology and Education, and Deakin University school of education Professor Philip Riley. The 2019 survey revealed school leaders were reporting an average working week of 55.2 hours during the school term, with about 97 per cent reporting more than 40 hours a week and 72.4 per cent working more than 50 hours a week. “School leaders continue to report sheer quantity of work, lack of time to focus on 16
Western Teacher June 2020
teaching and learning, and student mental health, as their main sources of stress,” the report stated. One WA respondent to the survey stated: “I love my job, I love what I do however, this same job creates a high level of stress, brings with it a level of abuse I have previously not experienced and makes me anxious.” The 2019 survey found that, compared to the general population, a higher percentage of school leaders reported being subjected to threats of violence – 51 per cent, compared to 7.8 per cent. Over 42 per cent of school leaders reported actual physical violence, compared to the general population’s figure of 3.9 per cent. WA had some of the country’s highest figures in this area, as seen in Table 1 (on page opposite). A WA secondary school leader reported: “My job has become more stressful over the last 12 months. A big increase in levels of violence and drug use among students, with a small group developing a gang mentality. Increasing amounts of time for me and my leadership team are spent dealing with extreme violent and abusive/aggressive behaviour from students, to the detriment of long-term planning and curriculum focus.” Almost 38 per cent of school leaders reported bullying, compared to 8.3 per cent of the general population, while the comparative figures for gossip and slander were 50.9 per cent versus 38.9 per cent. “Last year school leaders told us they were struggling from many serious workrelated issues including stress caused by parents, burn-out from the sheer quantity of work, employer demands and student and staff mental health issues,” Professor Marsh said.
“The combined impact of record levels of heavy workloads and offensive behaviour by parents and students is a risk to school leaders’ long-term health and even their life expectancy.” Professor Riley said school leaders were overwhelming in their feedback that a line in the sand had to be drawn to end violence in schools. He said the sudden changes to education delivery prompted by COVID-19 restrictions required an unprecedented response by school leaders to roll-out remote learning opportunities for their students. “We know from anecdotal evidence that many parents, although impacted themselves, are deeply appreciative of this work by principals and educators,” Professor Riley said. “We hope this points to a future in which there is greater awareness and acknowledgement of the many stresses and challenges that principals face on a regular basis as they lead their students and staff.” Other findings of the 2019 study were that more than 70 per cent of school leaders were over 50 years old, with a quarter over 60 and nearing retirement. “It should be no surprise that fewer educators are willing to step up and take on the increasingly-complex role of school principal,” Professor Riley said. “The low replacement rate for retiring school principals tells a truly dire story about our education system which should concern us all and needs further investigation.” One of the report's key recommendations is that “the Australian education system would benefit from stable policies that transfer with changes in government.”
