The significant gap between teachers and leaders when it comes to perceptions of pupil behaviour has been set out in a government survey.
The majority of school leaders (81 per cent) reported that their school had been calm and orderly “every day” or “most days” in the past week, versus just half of teachers (53 per cent).
Teachers were “significantly” more likely (33 per cent) than school leaders (11 per cent) to report that pupil behaviour was “poor” or “very poor”, the DfE survey found.
The findings come from the Department for Education’s , which was published alongside the government’s rollout of attendance and behaviour hubs.
This week also saw the appointment of former head Jayne Lowe and previous DfE behaviour Tom Bennett as the national attendance and behaviour ambassadors, who will oversee the hubs programme.
Few teachers ‘very confident’ handling behaviour
The behaviour survey also found that only a third of teachers considered themselves “very confident” at managing misbehaviour (31 per cent) in 2024, which has decreased “significantly” from 41 per cent in polling taken earlier that year.
However, two-thirds of school leaders said that they were “very confident” when tackling poor behaviour.
The number of suspensions and exclusions reached record highs in England’s state schools in 2023-24, with leaders warning Tes that they lack alternatives to removing students from the school site.
Parents are also less supportive of school behaviour rules, according to the survey: 83 per cent were supportive in 2024, compared to 87 per cent in 2023.
Quarter of pupils do not feel consistently safe at school
The survey also quizzed pupils on their experiences of school.
When asked how often they felt safe at school, just a third (32 per cent) of all pupils said that they had felt safe at school “every day” in the past week in May 2024.
This is a “statistically significant decrease” from 39 per cent in May 2023, the survey found.
Only 21 per cent felt safe on “some days” and 4 per cent said that they had “never” felt safe in the past week.
However, the majority (75 per cent) of pupils felt they were motivated to learn, an increase from 71 per cent in May 2023.
