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Victims of Educator-Targeted Bullying: A Qualitative Study on Teacher Harmful Experience
Abstract
Bullying in school has become an international concern in recent years, and the issue became urgent after school closure during COVID Pandemic. International studies have identified teacher-targeted bullying by students as a real and harmful issue for teacher wellbeing. Our paper sets out discursive issues surrounding bullying against teachers as targets of intentional bullying. It reports on the findings of a small-scale, extant, qualitative research study on commenters’ understanding of the antecedents of teacher-targeted bullying. The aim was to gain insights into the teachers´ targeted bullying from the perspective of teacher victims. We conducted a qualitative descriptive research design stemming from semi-structured interviews with victims of teacher-targeted bullying. A thematic content analysis of the data was generated from interviews with seventeen victimized teachers as a snowball sampling. The sample consisted of male (n = 7) and female (n = 10) participants from urban school locations in the capital of Czech Republic. The focus of our study was to determine how the teachers who had been experiencing bullying by their students described and perceived the nature and consequences attributed to such bullying. The findings indicate that the victims of teacher-targeted bullying were exposed repeatedly over long time verbal and nonverbal bullying, ignoring the teaching activities and other threats directed against teachers. Our results suggest bullying had a negative influence on the victims’ private lives (family, colleagues), physical and mental health and self-esteem.
This study was undertaken in 2018 with funding from the DVC(R) Research Engagement Income Growth Fund and HuSS IRGS Supplementary Support Fund. It received the support of the Association of Heads of Independent Schools of Australia (Ahisa) and the Australian Education Union (Victoria branch). This project aimed to shed light on teachers' experiences of feeling bullied and victimised while working in Australia’s Independent and Public Schools and presents findings of the incidence and impact of student and parental Teacher Targeted Bullying and Harassment (TTBH). To our knowledge, this is the first research of its kind in Australia.
It was found that while there is mounting evidence that teachers suffer ongoing incidences of Teacher Targeted Bullying and Harassment, there is a paucity of research which explores teachers' reports of being bullied by students and parents. It also found that many teachers feel they struggle to feel respected professionally and believe their reports of teacher targeted bullying and harassment are often ignored or downplayed by management and peak bodies. Finally, it was found that teacher targeted bullying and harassment by students and parents has detrimental effects on a teacher’s sense of self-efficacy and wellbeing and may contribute to an unsafe workplace.
This article sets out discursive issues surrounding bullying and harassment against teachers. This problematic phenomenon of teachers being bullied by students does not have the discursive policy framework to realistically and even-handedly enable discussion in the public arena or political and policy environments. This discussion chronicles our journey towards greater conceptual clarity and appropriate nomenclature about bullying and harassing behaviours directed against teachers. International studies have identified teacher-targeted bullying by students as a real and detrimental issue for teacher wellbeing. We present a sampling of international research that grapples with the challenge of defining the phenomenon of teachers as targets of intentional bullying and harassment by students. We consider Australian studies conducted in the past twenty years that address teachers’ perceptions of being bullied. Finally, we propose that this phenomenon is likely to continue until there is sufficient support to start a cultural shift towards more respectful treatment of teachers.
This study investigated educator-targeted bullying (ETB) in a South African school setting from a social-ecological perspective. Seven survivors of ETB were interviewed using open ended questions. The data were content analysed for themes. The main findings of the study were: (1) bullies are undisciplined individuals who lack parental support; (2) school and classroom management styles may encourage ETB; and (3) a lack of positive values in the community and a disregard for authority figures perpetuate ETB. Survivors of ETB perceived to lack support from colleagues, school management, and parents of the offending learners.
This paper addresses the issue of bullying of teachers by pupils, which is referred to as teacher targeted bullying (TTB). The aim of this study was to document the nature, duration and level of TTB in an inner London school. The writers believe the results indicate the need for public and professional recognition that TTB exists and that it is a complex problem which can affect teacher performance, morale, and student learning.
Victimized teachers’ experiences about teacher targeted bullying by students
- K Koiv
- M Aia-Utsal
Teacher targeted bullying and harassment
- E A Burns
- M Fogelgarn
- P Billet
Almost every Australian Teacher has been Bullied by Students
- P Billett
- E Burns
- R Fogelgarn
Teachers bullied by students: forms of bullying and perpetrator characteristics
- T Kauppi
- M Porhola