Western Australia\'s Department of Education Duty Care

Western Australia's Department Of Education Duty Care Policy Statement

Western Australia's Department of Education Duty of Care Policy Statement

Teachers have a duty to care for their students. In order to ensure that teachers are responsible and held accountable for an appropriate level of care for their students, teachers in Western Australia have to follow the tenants of the Western Australia's Department of Education Duty of Care Policy Statement. The document provides three main tenants all teachers and school facilities must obey: teaching staff has the responsibility to prevent foreseeable harm from occurring to their students, use professional judgment in the execution of responsibilities, and provide the appropriate level of supervision (Government of Western Australia Department of Education 2007).

The first scenario presents a case where a teacher is trying to teach a student better behavior through punishment strategies using a time out. In this case, the teacher removed a disruptive student from the classroom in order to teach that student a lesson based on what their negative behavior may invoke. Although it may benefit the class to have the disruptive student removed from the room, it also places him or her in danger considering they are clearly outside of the teacher's view. Thus, the teacher is not performing his or her duty of care to that student who is being alienated as a type of punishment.

Action plan

It is clear that the school must take action to address this situation, as it presents a situation where the teacher and school could be liable if the student is placed in harm's way in the absence of teacher supervision while on school grounds. Here, there research suggests that "teachers must take reasonable care to ensure that their students do not meet with foreseeable injury. They have a duty to protect the children against foreseeable risks of personal injury or harm" (Citizens Information 2009). Yet, leaving a child alone to fend for him or herself during a time out situation opens up a wide variety of potential situations where the child could be injured or do harm to others or property. As such, it is clear that the teacher has the responsibility of care not to leave children alone on their own accord in any situation, as that child would then be in risk of being alone in the event of an injury or other event. Actions must be taken against any teachers who utilize such strategies in order to help them understand that their liability, as well as the school's in general, does not permit them to use time out strategies based on the possibility that the child might have an incident that could have been avoidable if they were still under the direct supervision of the teacher. That teacher, as well as others, must know that to deal with disruptive students, they must be sent to an administrative office, where they can be still punished for their behavior yet under proper supervision. All schools must provide such supervision in administrative areas that deal with disruptive students. If a particular teacher fails to utilize these facilities, they would receive warning from the school.

In the second scenario, the supervising teacher in a lunchtime environment leaves the lunch yard to attend to the needs of a single student. In his or her absence, a student teacher is left to then take responsibility over the rest of the students on the lunch yard. Obviously, the supervising teacher had to assist the student in need after the incident that sent the student to the administrative block. However, this raises concerns over how well a student teacher can perform the intense supervision that is required normally by certified teachers who have been through enough experience to uphold the measures in the Duty Care Policy. Essentially, the student teacher does not have the experience nor the ability to take on the duty of care the supervising teacher has for the rest of the students on the lunch yard. When the teacher leaves to handle the one single incident, he or she is essentially opening up their responsibility for another untold number of incidents in their absence. With the student teacher not being one to be able to claim absolute full responsibility in terms of a major incident or accident, the supervising teacher would then be responsible for anything that happened in his or her absence.