Nova Scotia to add 47 new staff to address violence in classrooms

The Nova Scotia Department of Education and Early Childhood Development is investing $976,000 to place 47 specialized staff in schools as part of a pilot program aimed at addressing and preventing violence in the classroom.

This comes after Nova Scotia's auditor general reported in June that violence in schools was on the rise. Kim Adair's report found that reported violent incidents increased by 60 per cent in the last seven years, reaching 27,000 incidents in 2023 alone.

The department said the new specialized staff include: 

• Eighteen educational assistants and teaching assistants who will work full time and fill in as substitutes.
   
• Four student supervisors.
   
• Five school safety leads, who will be similar to security guards.
   
• Eight child and youth care practitioners.
   
• Twelve senior teachers whose role will be to manage classrooms and complex behaviours. 

Education Minister Becky Druhan said the new staff will supplement other specialized behavioural and support personnel already employed in Nova Scotia's public school system.

"This is just one step of many, many steps that we are taking," she said, noting she does not yet have information on which schools will receive the new staff. 

The department said regional centres for education and the Conseil scolaire acadien provincial will decide how to use the new positions and the plan is to "expand things that are working." 

Union is 'optimistic'

Peter Day, president of the Nova Scotia Teachers Union, welcomed the pilot as a "first step."

"It's a way to recognize, I believe, that the government is now taking seriously the concerns that the NSTU has been talking about for years that is violence in our schools," he said. 

Day said he is optimistic about the program and hopes it will expand to cover the 373 schools around the province if it has a positive effect during the pilot stage.

According to the union, while data is not out yet, school violence this year is "comparable to last year" and the issue is still at the forefront for many teachers, parents and students. 

Opposition says it's not enough

Liberal Leader Zach Churchill was skeptical and said 47 new staff members is insufficient.

"I've been in schools that are overcapacity by the hundreds. This is going to create problematic situations [that] 47 new staff are not going to be able to keep up [with]."

NDP Leader Claudia Chender is likewise not convinced. 

"I think it was an announcement for the sake of an announcement," she said. "We're waiting for a [new] code of conduct policy that we were originally told would be here in September."

The existing code of conduct was criticized in the auditor general's report for not having a clear definition of violence in schools, using the term "unacceptable behaviours" instead. 

Druhan said the updated code of conduct will be up for consultation "in the very near future" and she aims to release it this school year.