The North East School Division (NESD) is seeing a decline in the number of violent incidents, according to a new report presented at their regular board meeting in Hudson Bay on April 28.
According to the report, there were 42 incidents this year. That’s down from 53 incidents reported three years ago.
NESD Education Director Stacy Lair said the report indicates a positive trend in reducing safety-related events across the division.
“We see an overall trend in both reports of some decline in numbers, both with our violent incidents as well with our threat assessment work, both for worrisome behaviour and then the number of threat assessments that we’re doing,” Lair explained.
The board of education in the North East School Division (NESD) monitors how safe schools in the division are through an annual Safe Schools report. Superintendent of Learning Randy Kerr and Coordinator of Learning Trevor Norum presented the data from this year’s report.
This report analyses violent incident data submitted through OurSTUDENTS documentation platform over the past three years.
Lair attributed the declining trend to the work that is being done by NESD schools.
“We see that we don’t have a lot of students that are having repeat incidents,” she said. “So we know that in the schools, they put together interventions and behaviour support plans, and our data would indicate that those things are working very well for those students.”
She added that these support plans mean students rarely have violent incidents and therefore have more success in the classroom.
“That’s what our data indicates when we look at it,” she said.
Division-wide, Lair said it can be difficult to get a read because the NESD has just under 5,000 students.
“When you’re talking about two dozen incidents reported or two dozen unique students reported or less than that, then that that it’s hard to analyze to a significant degree just because the incident rate is quite low,” Lair said.
Lair said that this is the third year that the data has been reported to the board. The idea initially came as a board request from trustees.
“They want to keep an eye on the supports that we have for our violent risk assessment protocols, our training of staff in that, for our response teams, and then as well in any kind of training and supports that are needed in the violent incident category as well,” Lair said. “All those things and processes are reported on and chatted about in line with the data.”
Trustees held the meeting at Hudson Bay Community School as part of a practice started by a previous board aimed at giving trustees a glimpse at every school in the division.
“It was important for them to really understand the context of the school to be seen in the schools and see and hear from the staff directly,” Lair said.
The board holds about half of their meetings outside on the NESD office in Melfort at different schools.
“The board members … get to be in all of the communities and get to touch base with the principal, who usually does a tour, and has an opportunity then to share some celebrations and perhaps some challenges from their building,” Lair said.
Lair said having the meetings coincide with the tour helps make this more efficient and reduce travel.
“Our delegations come from all over the communities anyway. So, sometimes then folks will wait to be a delegation when the meeting is within their home community,” Lair said.
Lair added that the tour and visit to Hudson Bay Community School was fantastic.
“One of our newer schools in the school division is just over 10 years old and we’re always so excited to hear from students and staff. Miss (Louise) Gel did our tour and we had an opportunity to have lunch with her and her vice principal, Michelle (Gulka),” Lair said.
Lair said the tours show her something about how schools in the NESD operate.
“I think one of the things that I really appreciate about our schools, and especially in Hudson Bay, is how it feels like a home,” Lair said. “They do such a good job with the environment to make it really welcoming and inviting to students and really feel like that’s the place we want them to come and that they belong.”
michael.oleksyn@paherald.sk.ca
