CORRECTION: The state school employees union is called the Oregon School Employees Association. A previous version of this story incorrectly reported the union’s title as the Oregon School Employees Union. The Enterprise apologizes for the error.
More than 20 Malheur County educators reported that students had attacked and injured them last year, but officials say training and better communication are helping to address such problems.
The school staffers – including instructional assistants, teachers and administrators – reported they had been kicked, punched, bitten or body-checked while dealing with combative students, according to records obtained by the Enterprise.
In Nyssa, which reported 13 “student-caused” incidents, two instructional assistants sustained concussions when attacked by a student, according to Jeremias Martinez, an instructional assistant at Nyssa Elementary School.
Martinez, who is also the zone director for the local Oregon School Employees Association chapter, the union for school employees, said another instructional assistant had speech problems after being assaulted by a student.
The Enterprise requested incident reports and workers’ compensation claim records from the Nyssa district and other Malheur County school districts, including Vale, Adrian and Ontario.
At press time, Ryan Hawkins, Nyssa School District superintendent, had only turned over a spreadsheet documenting the number of incidents in Nyssa during the 2023-24 school year and the number of workers’ compensation claims the district reported that were filed by employees. The spreadsheet noted that five Nyssa employees filed a claim.
The Ontario School District reported seven incidents last year, up from three the year before. The district said three administrators, two instructional assistants and a pair of teachers went to an emergency room with various injuries – to the head, neck, back and shoulders. Those injuries did not result in any missed work days, according to the records.
One incident involved “multiple” staffers, according to Taryn Smith, district public relations manager. According to workers’ claims, an incident at Cairo Elementary injured three staffers, including a principal, a learning specialist and an educator.
The Vale School District had one student-caused incident last year. At Vale Elementary School, a staffer was kicked in the shin by a male student in a second-grade classroom, according to an incident report. Vale administrators declined to disclose the name and title of the employee who was attacked by the student.
As the student became more aggressive, the school employee cleared the classroom of other students as he began to throw objects at the staff. The report noted that beforehand, employees had grabbed his water bottle and thermos, in which he kept his lunch. At one point, according to the report, the student charged the employee, attempting to hit her, knocking her glasses off her face and breaking her necklace.
The report said that she put her hands over the student’s arms and put her foot and leg in front of him to keep him from kicking her, but he attempted to punch, bite and head-butt her. Each time she and another staffer tried to back away, the student came after her, according to the report.
“I signed stop and said ‘STOP’ in a loud/stern voice,” the educator wrote. “He sat and paused and then came at me again.”
Finally, after about two minutes, the report noted that the student accepted a blanket from the school employee he tried to attack. He then asked for a beanbag and “buried himself underneath it,” according to the report.
“When he had the beanbag, he began to settle,” the report said.
Alisha McBride, superintendent of the Vale School District, wrote in a report that the employee was “emotionally distraught” by the incident. McBride, who was at the elementary school the day the staffer was attacked, said the employee told her that she was struggling emotionally from the attack but did not mention a physical injury. McBride wrote that the employee went home for the rest of the day.
The employee filed a workers’ compensation claim, but the claim was denied with the incident deemed “non-disabling,” according to district records.
According to Oregon statute, staff are permitted to restrain or restrict a student’s movement only when it poses an imminent risk to themselves or others. McBride wrote in her report that the employee’s actions were “reasonable” and within the parameters of the guidance.
Seclusion – isolating a student in a room or area where they cannot leave – also is only permitted if a student poses a danger to themselves or others. Only staff who have had training are permitted to restrain or seclude a student, according to the law.
Martinez said recently-passed legislation allowing instructional assistants to sit in on meetings with teachers, parents and students has helped make staff aware if a student has behavioral issues.
Attending the meetings and gaining those insights has led to a decrease in the number of incidents, he said.
Mark Redmond, superintendent of the Malheur Education Service District, said the region is conducting restraint and seclusion training. At least one staffer for every 50 students in an education service district must be trained in a state-approved, nonviolent restraint and seclusion training program.
The intent of the training, Redmond said, is to de-escalate such situations and use restraint techniques as a last resort.
Redmond said in recent years, behavior issues in the classroom have escalated. Pandemic-induced school closures, along with increasing poverty, impact access to resources to address student mental health and behavioral issues, he said.
Redmond said the pandemic had the most glaring effect on student mental health and behavior.
“You had students at home for a long period of time without any social interaction,” he said. “And they lose the ability to properly play with other kids because they weren’t playing with other kids.”
News tip? Send your information to Steven Mitchell at [email protected].
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