| Date | 24 June 2026 |
| Time | 12.00pm-3.40pm AEST (Sydney time) |
| Venue | Live Online with recording (recording access expires 24 July 2026) |
| Pricing | $440 Prices includes gst. |
| Sector | NSW State Schools |
| CPD | Addresses 7.2 of the Australian Professional Standards for Teachers NSW |
| Other related LawSense Events |
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Program
12.00 LawSense Welcome
12.05 Chairperson’s Remarks
Melanie Meers, Principal Coach Mentor (PC-M), School Excellence Principal Support Team, School Excellence Directorate, Public Schools, NSW DET; Former, Principal, Anson Street School; SPC Reference Group Leader, Inclusion & Wellbeing
Lila Mularczyk OAM, Education Consultant; former Director, Secondary Education, NSW Department of Education; Past President, NSW Secondary Principals’ Council
12.10 Social Media, Bullying, Student AVOs: Navigating Recent Cases, Rapid Review, Bullying on Social Media, Students Online Targeting Staff, Obligations Beyond the School Gate, Dissatisfied Parents, AVOs Between Students
Applicable Laws and Government Anti-Bullying Rapid Review
- Outlining relevant laws applying to student bullying
- Examining the implications of the Anti-Bullying Rapid Review
- Examining obligations in identifying bullying, including grey areas such as social exclusion
School Obligations Beyond the School “Gate”
- Reviewing recent cases and implications regarding a school’s duty to address bullying beyond the school gate – how has this been extended?
Navigating Particular Challenges with Online Bullying
- Navigating particular challenges in dealing with online bullying, including determining the extent of your duties for conduct outside school hours, or conduct involving students outside the school
Supervision/Monitoring of Online Activity, Including Student Activity Outside School Hours
- Exploring the boundaries of a school’s duty of care in monitoring student online activity, including outside school hours
Managing Challenges in Proving Bullying Conduct
- Managing Challenges in investigating and proving bullying conduct, including searches of student devices and files and interviewing students
Parent Demands or Dissatisfaction with School Response
- Dealing with parents seeking to dictate consequences for the perpetrator of bullying, including parents providing reports from psychologists or other professionals
AVOs Between Students
- Interpreting and managing AVOs between students as a result of bullying allegations
Dealing With Students Targeting Staff Online
- Outlining the applicable laws and obligations where students target staff online, including:
- potential offences by the student and reporting to police
- obligations to staff, including psychosocial hazards
- navigating circumstances where it is not an offence, but potential bullying or breach of school values
Student Social Media Update: Navigating Social Media Age Limits and Learnings from School Experiences
- Examining the impacts of the new laws regarding age limits on social media use, including examining exceptions
- Exploring the implications of the new laws for schools:
- exploring impacts on the duty of care
- what action should you take if you suspect students are using social media in breach of the age limit?
- do the changes provide further rights or expectations for the school to search student devices or monitor social media use
- Learnings from school experiences to date
- Updating school polices to deal with the changes in social media laws
Leighton Hawkes, Principal, McCabes Lawyers
1.15 Break
1.25 Students with a Disability Affecting Behaviour: Navigating, Rights, Obligations, Reasonable Adjustments and Medication Management
Key Applicable Laws
- Outlining key laws applying to disciplining students with a disability:
- discrimination law
- Disability Standards for Education
- laws applying to restrictive practices
- duty of care to other students
- employment laws
- privacy laws
- Balancing the rights and obligations to staff versus obligations regarding student discrimination, duty of care and behaviour
- Understanding the rights and responsibilities of the school versus health experts to determine what the student requires to meet the diagnosis or disability
Risk Assessments, Reasonable Adjustments and Managing Behaviour Support Resources
- Exploring the range of disabilities encountered by schools impacting behaviour or causing significant impacts of students
- Reasonable adjustments:
- how should schools approach determining the limits of reasonable adjustments required in each circumstance?
- balancing impacts on other students and staff, including teacher workload
- managing differences in views between experts, parents and the student about adjustments
- dealing with dis-engaged parents or carers
- managing experts: responding to experts, briefing, and managing school experts
- Developing and managing effective risk assessments
- Planning conversations with parents, carers or experts in challenging matters
- Documenting steps and decision making regarding reasonable adjustments to ensure compliance and optimise your legal position
Managing Medication Challenges
- Navigating obligations in managing medication issues and dealing with challenges, including:
- understanding who within a school can administer medication, including exploring when teaching staff can administer medication
- students skipping/not taking medication
- parents not managing or administering student medication
Case Studies and Scenarios
- Learnings from case studies and scenarios of reasonable adjustments
Tim McDonald, Principal, McCabes Lawyers
2.25 Break
2.35 Effectively Managing Suspensions and Expulsions of Students with a Behavioural Disability
- Exploring how proposed changes to the Disability Discrimination Act 1992 (Cth) could impact suspension and expulsion of students with a disability
Navigating Application of School Rules
- Exploring scenarios where schools are asked to make exceptions to rules due to disability
- Understanding the extent to which schools can enforce rules without breaching discrimination laws
Case Studies: Discipline, Suspensions and Expulsions Where the Student Has a Disability Affecting Behaviour
- Outlining and balancing key laws applying to suspension and expulsion of students with a disability affecting behaviour:
- laws applying to student rights and procedural fairness
- obligations to staff, including WHS and other obligations
- School discipline examples and case studies – assessing and navigating options:
- managing ongoing discipline of a student with behavioural disability issues
- navigating suspensions, including assessing how long the student should be excluded
- expulsion of a student with behavioural disability – key considerations and navigating pitfalls
- Effectively documenting steps, communications, and decisions regarding expulsions to protect your legal position
Christa Lenard, Partner, Kingston Reid
3.35 Closing Remarks
3.40 Webinar Close
Presenters / panelists include:
Lila Mularczyk Lila Mularczyk was Principal at Merrylands High School for 15 years. She was the President of the NSW Secondary Principals’ Council (SPC) and Director of Secondary Education. Lila currently works with principals, the DoE, and universities.
Leighton Hawkes commenced his career in claims management and other technical roles with a major Australian insurance, working on claims for the NSW Treasury Managed Fund (TMF). Leighton has acted for the NSW Department of Education for a significant number of years. Presently he acts in a diverse range of matters, including claims arising from public liability, property damage to NSW schools, historical sexual abuse, discrimination (employee and disability), and Coronial enquiries.
Tim McDonald practises in employment and industrial law, work health and safety, discrimination, bullying and harassment, management of injured workers and termination of employment. Over the last 20 years, Tim has advised and represented private and public sector employers, including schools and higher education.
Christa Lenard is a workplace relations and employment lawyer with extensive experience in advising public sector departments and agencies at both Commonwealth and state level, as well as large and medium private sector companies.