What’s Behind the Rise in Violence Against Teachers?
Violence against teachers, most often by students, which has many instructors retiring or transferring around the country, has beset Massachusetts schools as well. Photo by Nur Arifina/iStock
What’s Behind the Rise in Violence Against Teachers?
BU expert says behavioral issues in children and teens predated COVID-19
Being a middle school or high school teacher can be challenging in normal circumstances. But a recent spate of student violence against instructors in and around Boston might have some wondering if the job deserves combat pay.
Last year, highly publicized student brawls at Revere High School, outside Boston, leaving a teacher and an administrator hurt, led to investments in security and behavioral health—and talk of whether it was time for metal detectors. “Weapons have been found in our building on numerous occasions over the last few years,” one instructor told the Boston Globe. “I am not stepping into a melee to get a blade in my ribs.” Revere is not an isolated case.
A Roxbury teacher asked an eighth grader to pay attention one day last fall—and got punched out for her trouble, sustaining numerous bruises. A nurse at a Dorchester school sustained a concussion and pinched nerve after an alleged student attack. Brockton last fall reported improvements from the 2023-2024 school year, which saw such chaos that some school committee members called, unsuccessfully, for deploying the National Guard at the high school. Both Lynn and Lowell school districts also reported teachers injured by students as well.
The violence has spurred a state effort to enhance safety, including identifying and preventing factors that lead to violence, as well as a similar effort by the Massachusetts Teachers Association (MTA), which plans to seek state funding for smaller classes and student behavioral support.
The problem isn’t confined to the Bay State either; the American Psychological Association last year reported an increase in teachers retiring or seeking transfers nationwide due to threats and violence—mostly from students, and to a lesser degree, parents and colleagues.
What’s behind the violence and might the efforts to address it work? BU Today asked Jennifer Greif Green, a professor of special education at Boston University’s Wheelock College of Education & Human Development. Green is a child clinical psychologist and researches student mental health.
Q&A
with Jennifer Greif Green
BU Today: What are the chances that the recent aggression and violence against teachers is just a fluke that will subside, rather than an indicator of some underlying ongoing issue?
Unfortunately, violence in schools is not new. And in times of stress, violence and aggression in schools—and communities—tend to rise. The American Psychological Association [APA] established a national task force focused on aggression toward teachers and school personnel. This task force conducted a nationwide survey and essentially found that many teachers report experiencing aggression in their workplaces, most often in the form of verbal aggression and threats. Understanding the experiences of educators in their workplaces is important for many reasons, of course—one of which is the likelihood that exposure to aggression in the workplace increases the chances that teachers will leave the profession.
BU Today: The APA report suggests that the return to post-COVID in-person learning is one cause for the violence. Do you agree, and why might that be triggering students?
Students were reporting increased behavioral health needs prior to the pandemic. Even though rates of aggressive behavior in schools fell during the pandemic—probably for obvious reasons, like absences and required distancing—there is evidence that these rates rebounded in the past few years, back to pre-pandemic levels. Our research team at BU Wheelock recently reported on this trend and also described some of the challenges in assessing the specific impact of the pandemic on behavioral health needs of youth, in the context of rates that were already climbing.
Students were reporting increased behavioral health needs prior to the pandemic.
So, while it’s possible that the return to in-person learning is related to increased aggression in schools, it’s really difficult to parse out what is related to the pandemic specifically and what is a continuation of a trend that was initiated well before the pandemic.
BU Today: What other causes might explain the recent incidents?
I think it’s important to be aware that children’s behavioral health services are consistently under-resourced. The BIRCh Project at UMass Boston has produced reports on the ratios of school mental health providers to students in Massachusetts schools and found that even though the number of providers has increased since the pandemic, they still fall far short of recommended ratios. We’re in a situation where we know that behavioral health needs of students are increasing, but continue to have limited resources to support them. This issue is currently receiving press because Governor Maura Healey’s 2026 budget includes some cuts to children’s behavioral health services. BU Today readers who are interested in legislation advocacy locally might want to follow the work of the Children’s Mental Health Campaign.
Of course, it’s not enough to have providers in school buildings. Staff need to be supported by administrators and have the time, availability, and skill set to provide evidence-based services that are culturally and linguistically sustaining. And broader communities need to be prepared to provide the resources that schools need to effectively serve their students.
BU Today: The state and the Massachusetts Teachers Association have initiatives to address the problem. Do you think they will succeed?
I think that they are on the right track in focusing their work on making systems-level changes, emphasizing preventive efforts, and aiming to improve the well-being of both staff and students. We know that the well-being of teachers is strongly associated with students’ experiences in the classroom. Protecting and supporting teachers is critical to establishing a school environment where youth can thrive.
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