General News
19 November, 2025
Schools respond to national anti-bullying review
BULLYING continues to have devastating effects on young Australians, impacting mental health, wellbeing, and learning outcomes. Students who experience bullying are three to six times more likely to face issues such as depression, self-harm, or suicidal ideation than their peers. Nationally, over one in four Year 4 to Year 9 students (27%) report being bullied every few weeks or more, while cyberbullying complaints have surged 455% since 2019.
According to the Anti-Bullying Rapid Review released just weeks ago, more than half of young Australians (53%) have been cyberbullied, and in 2024, 46% of reports involved children aged 13 or younger.
Bullying has broad and lasting effects, from reduced school attendance and achievement to lifelong social and economic impacts.
The review calls for consistent anti-bullying requirements across schools, with an emphasis on whole-school and community collaboration.
Recommendations include early intervention, clear escalation pathways, trauma-informed professional development for staff, and tailored local implementation.
Locally, schools are already reflecting on these changes and reinforcing their own approaches to student wellbeing.
Ararat North Primary School Principal Jessica Erhardt said the review reinforces the importance of unified standards across schools.
“I think consistency is really important,” she said.
“So something coming out that all schools can utilise is really important and could only benefit our community because everyone knows where they stand. New students coming in and going out, if it’s consistent across all schools in the state, it makes it easier for them to understand the expectations around bullying in our schools.”
Ararat North, which currently has 50 students, has already implemented programs to improve behaviour across the school.
“Things that we currently do already is we have a really explicitly outlined behaviour management policy we expose our kids to regularly,” Ms Erhardt said.
At the start of each term, Ararat North Primary includes information sessions as a reminder outlining acceptable and unacceptable behaviours and all the consequences aligned with those behaviours.
Ms Erhardt said collaboration between schools and families is essential.
“I think the other thing that is really important is to work together with the families. Looking at the holistic student experience, home and school working together in partnership.”
She added that early education on respect and behaviour helps prevent conflict before it escalates.
“Educating our students on how we should be treated and how we should accept being treated, hopefully, will give them that picture of what’s right and what’s wrong so you don’t get to that stage where little issues become big issues.”
At Marian College, Principal Catherine Howison said the school is eager to study the full report and its recommendations.
“As a college, we are interested in reading the full report, particularly the recommendations. I know there’s been a lot of discussion about the 48-hour response time, which I think is really interesting because as a school we would want to be responding to an issue of bullying within 48 hours, possibly shorter,” she said.
“There’s a difference between responding and resolving,” she added.
“We know that instances of bullying can be really complex. And you obviously want to keep people safe in the immediate instance. But then you want to make sure that you work towards resolving and restoring.”
For Marian College, that restorative focus aligns with its principles.
“As a Catholic school, that restoration part is really important for us. We know that young people can make really poor choices, and we need to support everybody in moving forward and being better for themselves, for their families, and for their community.”
Ms Howison said that while schools play a central role, bullying is a community-wide issue.
“What the report very clearly outlines is that it needs to be a community approach. We see bullying in schools, we see bullying in the workplace, we see bullying in community groups,” she said.
“The most effective anti-bullying strategy is actually to have a whole community approach to creating a culture that is positive, that is supportive, codifies accepted behaviours that lift people rather than isolate people.”
Marian College has already begun implementing School-Wide Positive Behaviour Support, a framework that reinforces positive student conduct.
“As teachers and educators, we're always called to be aware of dealing appropriately and effectively with issues for young people,” Ms Howison said.
“We’ve talked to students about behaviour. We’ve talked to students about bullying. It's part of our wellbeing program. We run a peer support program. There’s lots of ways that we try to educate our young people through our curriculum as well.”
Ms Howison welcomes the review as a chance to create a checklist for all schools,
“What the (Anti-Bullying Rapid Review) report does, I think, is put it in very plain terms, these are the things that need to be attended to. You can simply go through it: Do we do that? Yes, we do. All right, great. Can we do it better?”
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