Responsive, not reactive: what two recent tribunal cases tell us about behaviour support in NZ schools

Two Teachers Disciplinary Tribunal decisions have been in the news recently, and they’re worth sitting with (not to single out individuals who were clearly caught without the right tools in the moment, but because both cases point to the same systemic gap).

At Auckland Montessori College, the Principal was censured after restraining a student who refused his medication at a school camp, leaving him bruised. Tribunal chair Jo Hughson found his response “hasty,” with no independent assessment of the situation before he moved straight to physical force.

At Massey Primary in West Auckland, the deputy principal restrained and secluded a student for almost an hour after he refused to do a task. Hughson found Allen “exhibited a lack of patience and an inability to regulate her own emotions” in response to his behaviour.

Two experienced educators. Two very different triggers: a medical refusal, a task refusal. Same underlying failure, no de-escalation, no assessment of what was actually driving the behaviour, straight to physical control.

The gap isn’t good intentions, it’s a missing skill set

Neither of these were educators who didn’t care. Both, by all accounts, were trying to keep a student safe or keep a classroom functioning. What was missing wasn’t compassion. It was a trained, practised alternative to reach for in the moment things started to escalate.

Reactive vs responsive: the distinction that matters

Reactive strategies are what happens when a staff member has no other tool. Behaviour occurs, and the response is driven by the adult’s own stress, frustration, or fear, not by an understanding of what the young person needs. It’s fast, unplanned, and (as both tribunal cases show) often disproportionate to what actually happened.

Responsive strategies start earlier. They begin with recognising the build-up (the signs that a student is becoming overwhelmed, anxious, or dysregulated) and intervening with de-escalation, communication, and environmental adjustment before a crisis point is reached. When physical intervention genuinely is necessary as a last resort, it’s proportionate, planned, and used with the minimum force required to keep everyone safe, not as a first response to non-compliance.

The Massey Primary policy quoted in the tribunal decision actually captures this well: restraint was only meant to be used where there was serious risk of imminent harm, and where the force used was reasonable and proportionate. The policy was sound. What was missing was the trained capacity to apply it under pressure, and everything that should have happened before that threshold was ever reached.

Where school-wide PB4L fits in

New Zealand’s PB4L School-Wide framework (similar to PBIS, Positive Behavioural Interventions and Supports) is built on exactly this principle: behaviour improves when you change the systems, environment, and adult responses around a student, not just the student. It works in tiers: universal supports for the whole school, targeted support for students who need more, and individualised support for a small few, and it’s explicitly meant to be shaped around each school’s own community, including a kaupapa Māori approach to wellbeing.

A framework like this sets the systems and culture: shared expectations, consistent language, tiered support. But it needs to be paired with the in-the-moment skill set staff need at every tier: how to recognise escalation early, how to communicate calmly and de-escalate, and how to intervene physically and safely only when it’s genuinely the last resort, briefly, proportionately, and in a way that protects the dignity and safety of everyone involved.

In other words, one answers “what should our school’s approach to behaviour be?” The other answers “what do our staff actually do, individually, in the moment a student is escalating?” Schools need both.

What certified training actually changes

Both tribunal cases turned on a moment where an educator had no rehearsed alternative to fall back on. Certified training changes that moment, not by adding another policy binder, but by giving staff:

• A framework for recognising early signs of distress or escalation, so intervention happens well before crisis point
• De-escalation and communication techniques that are practised, not improvised
• Clear criteria for when, if ever, physical intervention is appropriate, and how to do it safely and proportionately
• A shared language across the whole staff team, so responses are consistent rather than dependent on whichever adult happens to be in the room
• The confidence that comes from having actually rehearsed the response, rather than encountering it for the first time under pressure

That last point matters more than it might seem. Arnold and Allen weren’t lacking policy. They were lacking rehearsal. Training that’s genuinely embedded (not a one-off session, but revisited and supported over time) is what turns “the policy says” into “I know what to do.”

The point isn’t blame

Cases like these tend to generate a debate about whether teachers should be allowed to touch students at all. That’s the wrong question. The right question is whether staff have been equipped, properly, and to a recognised standard, to respond safely and positively before things reach the point where restraint is even on the table. PRICE Training is about protecting the rights of all within care environments, as such it offers certified, rights-based training that gives every member of staff the supportive tools to respond with care and understanding rather than relying on reactive approaches that are led by a lack of knowledge, fear or pressure.

The author is Strategic Lead for PRICE Training in NZ with over 30 years working in the SEND and Alternative Education space in Aotearoa New Zealand.

Published September 2026