A 16-year-old boy appeared in Quebec youth court on Friday morning, following the stabbing of a teacher at a Montreal high school.
The assault took place at John F. Kennedy High School on Thursday morning, when a student entered a Grade 7 classroom.
“The student stabbed the teacher at least once to the upper body,” Montreal police spokesperson Jean-Pierre Brabant told Global News on Thursday.
The incident prompted a temporary lockdown as officers searched the grounds to find the student allegedly involved in the attack.
A 16-year-old was arrested not far from the school a short time later.
The teacher, a 40-year-old man, was taken to hospital where he underwent surgery.
The accused, who cannot be identified because of his age, faces four charges including attempted murder, aggravated assault, possession of a weapon for a dangerous purpose and possession of a concealed weapon.
A spokesperson for the Crown prosecutor told Global News that they will be asking for an adult sentence if the teen is found guilty.
Classes at John F. Kennedy High School were cancelled on Friday and are only set to resume on Tuesday.
While a trauma team is being made available to students and staff, many in the community say more needs to be done.
“There’s a lot going on in the world and in school and it’s affecting our kids,” said Caleigh Saucier, chair of the English Montreal School Board’s parents committee.
“So we just hope there will be more resources available to them so we can prevent future events of this nature.”
Public Security Minister Geneviève Guilbault agreed prevention is key.
“It is worrying and that’s why we acted,” she said, citing an appearance in Montreal last Sunday in which she announced $52 million in new money aimed at supporting community organizations that work with youth, be it in schools or elsewhere.
“We can keep our young people from choosing violence, from choosing criminality, from making bad choices in life,” Guilbault said.
“So we have to provide them with good alternatives — with other ideas, other projects, other ways of occupying themselves.”
Heidi Yetman, president of the Quebec Provincial Association of Teachers (QPAT), said teachers also need more support, so they can focus on doing their job.
She said resources for public schools have diminished, meaning there are fewer guidance councellors, psychologists, nurses and behavioural technicians, leaving teachers to fill in the gaps.
“Teachers are not getting the support that they need; they’re not specialists in this,” Yetman said.
She added that teachers have been dealing with an increasingly violent workplace environment.
Citing a 2018 survey by QPAT, Yetman said 56 per cent of respondents had experienced violence towards them, be it psychological or physical.
“If it was in any other workplace, something would have been done. There would have been actions,” she said.
And while the survey raised awareness of the issue, Yetman said teachers need to report incidences of violence to affect change.
“It’s essential. We need to have the data, we need to have paperwork,” she said. “We need to show the school boards and the government that violence is occurring in our schools on a daily basis.”
— with files from Global News’ Olivia O’Malley
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