Over the last few decades, both New Zealand and the intergovernmental organisation of UNESCO have widely spread the rhetoric of safety through a broad range of educational issues. This notion, in vogue since the neoliberal turn, has raised little opposition in educational debates. In this article, we use a Foucauldian lens to analyse the…

In the last few decades, the word 'safety' has become silently but increasingly pervasive in educational policies and debates, gaining a new momentum with the pandemic. Our intention in this article is to problematise what is done in schools in the name of safety by delving into the safety policy discourses of a New Zealand school and the…

This paper focusses on our concerns about revelations about sexual harassment in universities and the inadequate responses whereby some universities seem more concerned about their own reputations than the care and protection of their students. Seldom do cases go to criminal court, instead they mostly fall within employment relations policies…

This article explores an apparent contradiction in LGBTTIQA+ students' narratives around how safe they feel on campus. While declaring they feel 'safe' and supported by other students and staff, participants' narratives contain a myriad of examples indicating they feel 'unsafe'. These incidents emerge during photo-elicitation interviews where…

During the COVID-19 pandemic, calls to protect children and young people have proliferated in educational contexts, consolidating safety as a core principle guiding an increasing number of decisions at schools. Recently, however, more and more scholars have begun to question the ambiguous nature of "safety", analysing the tensions…

Over the past two decades, there has been rapid growth in understanding of bullying in schools and its many negative effects. The reported incidence of bullying and other school violence has increased over time, and UNESCO recently estimated that 246 million children and adolescents experience violence in and around school every year (UNESCO…

Truancy is a longstanding, unresolved educational issue in countries where there are compulsory attendance policies. It represents a long-term cost to society in expenditure on health, well-being and incarceration. Previous research has focused on key demographic variables related to truancy, causal factors, interventions and a variety of…

The New Zealand Curriculum (2007) states that all students have the right to learn in an environment that is inclusive and safe. Teachers in New Zealand are responsible for upholding these and many other values, ensuring that each student's "unique set of experiences, abilities and interests, and differences in how they learn" (Ministry…

This study reports a subset of findings from a larger study that examined the emotional impacts of the 22 February 2011 Christchurch earthquake on 20 teachers, who functioned as first responders when the earthquake struck in the middle of a normal school day. This qualitative study investigated the emotion regulation strategies employed by these…

Despite mandates that require schools to be safe places for all students, issues persist around the provision of safety for lesbian, gay, bi-sexual, trans-sexual, and trans-gendered students and staff. The current study reports the initial two stages of an action research project undertaken in a New Zealand secondary school, which aimed to enhance…

Purpose: Inspection and evaluation in education gained a different dimension with the implementation of concepts such as accountability, transparency and effectiveness to educational organizations. School self-evaluation is put into practice based on evidence in cooperation with stakeholders in order to develop and improve schools accordingly. The…

The Canterbury, New Zealand, earthquake disaster of 2010-2011 had a major impact on children. The present study aims to increase understanding of schools' contributions to children's recovery by examining how this core context fosters children's effective coping in a disaster. The study uses a phenomenological approach to investigate the disaster…

School safety is an important factor in schools. Data from the IEA's Trends in International Mathematics and Science Study (TIMSS) indicate that perceptions of school safety are directly related to academic success. School safety seems to be particularly relevant for immigrant students, as their perceptions of safety appear to be more strongly…

This report describes a study that analysed Wellbeing@School student and teacher survey data from 400 New Zealand schools. The study explored the following questions: (1) Are there school practices associated with higher levels of student wellbeing or lower levels of student aggressive behaviours?; and (2) Are some school or student…

New Zealand students face challenges to their social and emotional wellbeing. There are high rates of school bullying compared with other countries. More needs to be done to foster young people's wellbeing and help them develop skills and competencies to manage their wellbeing. Multifaceted Whole School Approaches are an effective way for schools…