Secret data reveals police have been called to schools over violent incidents with aggressive parents

Police have been called to Victorian schools to defuse “highly aggressive” and sometimes violent incidents involving parents. Here are just some.

Teachers and even school students have been threatened by aggressive parents.

Violent parents are lashing out at teachers and pupils across state schools, with police being called to schools to defuse the “highly aggressive” incidents.

Data exclusively obtained by the Sunday Herald Sun under Freedom of Information laws reveals several reports of parents displaying violent and aggressive behaviour against staff and students between 2019-20.

Aggressive incidents on school grounds include:

*Staff and police being forced to intervene in a verbal fight between the father and stepfather of an eight-year-old student.

*Police slapped a mother with an IVO for being “physically aggressive” and abusing someone else’s daughter on school grounds. She also threatened a teacher.

*A school principal was forced to escort one mother of a 12-year-old year 7 student after she threatened three boys.

*A mother was escorted off school grounds after threatening two three-year-old and seven-year-old boys.

Teachers claim parents became “highly aggressive” at the height of the pandemic.

The cases come as the state government has brought in new rules that give principals the authority to ban adults who engage in threatening behaviour online or in person, with a possible penalty of up to $10,000 for those who don’t comply.

Victorian Principals Association president Andrew Dalgleish said the impact of violence at schools was “very significant”.

“We wish that it didn’t happen and at every stage schools particularly work incredibly hard with their families and communities to maintain a positive relationship at all times,” he said.

A principal from Melbourne’s outer east told the Sunday Herald Sun parents had become “highly aggressive” at the height of the pandemic.

“The pandemic was a very stressful time and parents had become very frustrated. Principals and staff were abused almost daily over things they had no control over,” he said.

“Any form of violence or aggressive behaviour is not welcome in our school community.”

Kylie Allen, a former primary school teacher and director of Inspiring Minds Studio, said she had seen parents being abusive on school grounds a number of times.

A St Albans school she worked at even had a lockdown called due to a parent’s actions.

“Some parents think it’s all about them and will do things like count the days off teachers take and want to fight their children’s battles for them,” she said.

“You see parents bailing up teachers every single day.”

Ms Allen said it was important parents found out both sides of every story and, if they did have to approach the school, relied on facts, not emotion.

A Department of Education spokesman said the School Community Safety Orders – which were implemented on June 28 – worked to stop adults in school communities from engaging in harmful, threatening or abusive behaviour on state school grounds.

“Incidents of violence or intimidating behaviour from parents, while very rare in Victoria’s more than 1,550 government schools, are never acceptable and are immediately referred to the police when appropriate,” he said.