17,500 STUDENT SUSPENSIONS LAST YEAR

And That's Just In Five School Boards, Including Halifax

EDUCATION -- With roughly 17,500 student suspensions last year, the
province had better get moving on tracking the problem.

So says NDP education critic Bill Estabrooks, a former principal who
was shocked by what's going on in the province's schools. He says he
couldn't believe the numbers on violence against students and
teachers, bullying, drugs and weapons in the schools.

Estabrooks complained that the Education Department announced it
would have all the province's school boards track the information
from 2003 onward. But there's still no standardized system in place.

'Need Benchmark'

"We need a benchmark, to see what it's going to be like in 2007-08,
and to see whether things have improved," he said.

Estabrooks also wants better breakdowns, so the public can see the
number of repeat offenders.

The NDP asked for suspension information from all eight provincial
school boards for the 2004-05 school year. Five boards responded:
Strait Regional, Tri-County, South Shore, Chignecto-Central and
Halifax Regional School Board.

Based on the responses, data showed that more than 25 per cent of the
province's suspensions were for physical or verbal assault or
bullying. Boards may not compile data in the same way, however.

The Halifax board had 6,376 suspensions. Of those, 1,866 were for
physical assault, fighting or physical harassment.

Another 914 were for verbal assault or verbal abuse. The next biggest
number was 510, for drug- and alcohol-related suspensions.

Education Minister Jamie Muir said the province is well on its way to
tracking the problem, but the idea is to come up with better strategies.

'Piece Of Paper'

"It's not just writing something down on a piece of paper, though
that's part of it," he said. "What we're really concerned with is,
how can we better address inappropriate behaviours?"

He also pointed to a program beginning in January, that will see
officials track bullying and "bad behavioural incidents" in 100
schools of all levels.