Stand-downs, suspensions, exclusions and expulsions guidelines – Part 2

About the guidelines

These guidelines:

  • are designed to assist school boards, principals, and teachers with their legal options and duties and meet their obligations under relevant statutory requirements, and
  • are for use in all state and state-integrated schools.

Independent schools may also wish to adopt this guide.

Please note:  The Education and Training Act 2020 has replaced the Education Act 1989.  Any references to the Education Act 1989 in the SSEE Guidelines  below should be replaced with the relevant sections in the new Education and Training Act 2020. This includes replacing the sections of the Act in the letters in the Good Practice Guidelines Part 2 (refer Appendix).

The guidelines comprise:

Part 1: Legal options and duties [PDF, 2.4 MB]

Part 2: Good practice [PDF, 2.4 MB]

These guidelines replace those published by the Ministry of Education in June 2004 and the 2007 Supplement. The paragraphs have been numbered for ease of use and reference. Cross-references to Part 1 – Legal options and duties are given where relevant.

Section 1: Contingency planning

This section provides information your school can use to be prepared, understand the situation, communicate with your local community and act quickly to manage incidents relating to student behaviour.

In this section

  • 1. School planning - Having plans in place will help boards prepare for incidents relating to student behaviour
  • 2. Understanding data - To inform your board’s response to student behaviour, look for patterns or differences in your stand-down, suspension and exclusion data
  • 3. Involving other people when managing student behaviour - When making a decision about your school’s response to student behaviour, it may be helpful to think about situations when other people could be involved
  • 4. Communicating about incidents of student behaviour - An effective communication plan can be essential to ensuring an incident with a student is managed appropriately by the school
  • 5. Traumatic incidents - A school experiencing an incident of student discipline may find the issue becomes complicated as it affects staff, students and the community and/or involves intense media pressure