Fractures, loss of sight and even amputations are among the severe injuries being suffered by teachers and other staff because of violence in schools, FactCheck can exclusively reveal.
Each year, hundreds of violent assaults are leaving staff with such serious injuries that they must be reported to safety regulators.
How many teachers are injured in schools?
The Health and Safety Executive (HSE) recorded 682 violence-related injuries to school staff in the year to March 2023 – double the number seen a decade before.
Injuries to primary school staff had trebled in a decade. More than half of the reports are now coming from primaries, including attacks leading to joint dislocations and loss of consciousness.
Separate figures obtained by Channel 4 News show that in both England and Wales, the most common age for a child to be suspended from school for physically assaulting an adult is six.
One primary school teacher in Scotland told us she had been attacked several times by pupils.
The teacher, who did not want to be identified, said a 10-year-old pupil had once threatened her with scissors, telling her he would rip her heart out and make her bleed to death.
She said: “My life flashed before me.”
Other school staff spoke of being kicked, head-butted and stamped on.
Darren Northcott, national official at the teaching union NASUWT, told Channel 4 News: “Some of those injuries can be life changing.
“In some instances we are talking about teachers who never teach again and are unable to because of the injuries that they’ve sustained.
“But the psychological impact is also significant. For many teachers that is enough to prompt them to decide not to continue their careers as teachers.”
Andrea Bradley, general secretary of Scottish teaching union EIS, said violence towards teachers “must be urgently addressed”, adding that more investment in staffing was needed.
Workplace injuries above a certain threshold of seriousness must be reported to the HSE, with the cause recorded.
The injuries were not necessarily inflicted by pupils – they could include any caused by parents or other adults.
They could also include injuries sustained as a result of challenging behaviour from children with special educational needs.
Across Great Britain, the HSE recorded nearly 5,000 violence-related injuries to school staff from 2012/13 to 2022/23, figures obtained through a Freedom of Information request show.
This included 1,011 fractures, 16 incidents causing a loss or reduction of sight and four incidents that led to amputations.
How many children are suspended for assaulting a teacher?
Separately, each year thousands of children across the UK are suspended from school for physically assaulting an adult, with more than 55,000 suspensions in the 2022/23 school year alone.
Figures obtained through a Freedom of Information request to the Department for Education show the most common age for children to be suspended for this reason in England that year was six.
In Wales, the most common age was also six, figures from the Welsh Government show.
Why are more teachers being injured in schools?
So what might be causing this behaviour at such a young age?
The reasons will be complex and varied, according to psychologists.
They could include an increase in mental health problems among young people, as well as children’s social development being hampered by time spent online, further exacerbated by the effects of the pandemic.
Dr Jenny Cosgrove is a senior educational psychologist with Applied Psychologies, a service working in schools across the north of England.
She said it was important to understand what could be happening biologically to a child in crisis because “especially for children at a young age, it’s not a malicious attempt to harm”.
“What we might see is a child who is highly dysregulated, who is highly stressed, who is in crisis, who we can see the fight, flight, freeze, emotional state,” she said.
“And how we see that in action is children throwing chairs, children hitting out, hitting out at walls or furniture, sometimes hitting out at themselves or hitting out at the adults around them.”
Another psychologist from the same team said there were lots of children waiting for places in specialist, non-mainstream education, which could be having an impact.
Mr Northcott said outside of schools, families were often struggling to access the support they needed from health and social care services right from the start of a child’s life.
He said: “Those have been decimated over the past decade and a half and that is bound to have an impact on some of the behaviours that we see in our schools.”
What are governments doing about violence in schools?
A spokesperson for the HSE said employers had a legal duty to assess risks to their workforce, including “risks arising from work-related violence and aggression”, and put in place measures to ensure their safety.
A spokesperson for the Department for Education said they were “committed to turning the tide on poor behaviour”, for example by providing access to a mental health professional in every school.
The spokesperson said they “know there is more to do and are looking closely at how we can go further to support teachers”.
A spokesperson for the Welsh Government said any form of violence in schools was “completely unacceptable”, adding that it was “working with partners to develop proposals to improve behaviour, including a summit”.
A spokesperson for the Scottish Government said it had published a joint action plan with local authorities, “to respond to concerns about relationships and behaviour in schools”.
How many teachers are injured due to violence in Northern Ireland?
Northern Ireland has a separate Health and Safety Executive and the threshold for reporting incidents is slightly different.
Figures obtained by Channel 4 News show there were 85 violence-related injuries sustained by school staff reported to the Health and Safety Executive for Northern Ireland between 2012/13 and 2022/23.
This included nine fractures.
A spokesperson for the Department of Education in Northern Ireland said any form of assault within schools was “entirely unacceptable”, adding that “guidance and support on the prevention of violence at work is provided by the employers to their schools and teachers”.
(Image credit: Macy Fosker/Shutterstock)
