July 26, 2018, Scoop: School leaders report high levels of violence http://www.scoop.co.nz/stories/ED1807/S00065/school-leaders-report-high-levels-of-violence.htm Senior primary school leaders are reporting high levels of violence in their schools, with 38% experiencing threats of violence in 2017, and 41% being subjected to actual physical violence. In the third part of a report, commissioned by NZEI Te Riu Roa from the Australian Catholic University, (see previous releases on the Discrimination and Burnoutreports) the Offensive Behaviour in Schools report raises serious safety and wellbeing issues. … “There are two parallel issues going on here. One is children with learning difficulties trying to access the help and support that they and their families need, and the other is adults whose behaviour in a learning environment is sometimes unacceptable…. Key findings: • 38% of all school leaders had experienced threats of violence in 2017. • 41% had experienced actual physical violence in that year. • Principals were slightly more likely than deputies to experience threats of violence, but deputies and assistants were more likely than principals to experience actual physical violence. • Both rates - threats and actual violence – had increased slightly since 2016. • Compared with the rates experienced by the general population, school leaders experience threats of violence at 4.87 the general prevalence, and physical violence at ten times the general prevalence. • Forty percent of female leaders were threatened with violence, compared to 34% of male leaders. Actual violence was reported by 43% of female leaders, compared to 38% of male leaders. … 1. There is an urgent need to increase resourcing, staffing and programmes to support the growing number of students with challenging behaviours. This should include: • The formalisation and funding of special needs coordinators in every school …
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Childhood Lost
Children today are noticeably different from previous generations, and the proof is in the news coverage we see every day. This site shows you what’s happening in schools around the world. Children are increasingly disabled and chronically ill, and the education system has to accommodate them. Things we've long associated with autism, like sensory issues, repetitive behaviors, anxiety and lack of social skills, are now problems affecting mainstream students. Blame is predictably placed on bad parenting (otherwise known as trauma from home).
Addressing mental health needs is as important as academics for modern educators. This is an unrecognized disaster. The stories here are about children who can’t learn or behave like children have always been expected to. What childhood has become is a chilling portent for the future of mankind.
Anne Dachel, Media editor, Age of Autism
http://www.ageofautism.com/media/
(John Dachel, Tech. assist.)
What will happen in another 4 years? How can we go on like this? This is a national (and international) problem of monumental proportions. We have an entire new class of children who cannot be accommodated by the system: many are manifestly neurologically impaired. Meanwhile, the government and the medical profession sleep on regardless.
John Stone,
UK media editor, Age of Autism
The generation of American children born after 1990 are arguably the sickest generation in the history of our country.
Robert F. Kennedy, Jr.
It seemed to me that with rising autism prevalence, you’d also see rising autism costs to society, and it turns out, the costs are catastrophic.
They calculated that in 2015 autism cost the United States $268 billion and they projected that if autism continues at its current rate, we’re looking at one trillion dollars a year in autism costs by 2025, so within five years.
Toby Rogers, PhD, Political economist
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