Punishment Won’t Fix This: A Call for Urgent Systemic Action and Nervous System Support in Schools

Renee Zilm
May 23, 2025
4 min read

Updated: Aug 26, 2025

The recent 9 News report highlighting escalating violence in classrooms is heartbreaking, but not surprising. Teachers are overwhelmed. Students are dysregulated. And the system is cracking.

Yet the proposed response from leadership? “Back principals to decide on punishments.”

Let’s be clear: punishment will not regulate a child’s nervous system. It may remove them temporarily, but it does not teach safety. It does not build capacity. It does not prevent the next explosion.

This is not just an education problem. It’s a whole-system failure, and it requires a whole-of-government response.

The Roots of Violence and Bullying in Children

Violence and bullying don’t begin in the classroom. They begin in the nervous system. A child who lashes out is a child whose internal world is overwhelmed and unsupported.

Adverse Childhood Experiences (ACEs), such as trauma, neglect, abuse, and instability, are directly linked to an increase in aggressive or oppositional behaviours (Felitti et al., 1998). Combine that with unmet sensory needs, neurodivergence, or mental health challenges, and we have a storm brewing before the school bell even rings.

Children today are also growing up with constant exposure to social media algorithms that reward outrage, polarisation, and performative conflict. The more children engage with harmful content, the more it is fed to them, shaping their beliefs, behaviours, and responses to stress. It’s a feedback loop of dysregulation, comparison, and emotional suppression.

Meanwhile, schools are being asked to fix what they didn’t break, with tools they were never given.

This Is Bigger Than Education

Where are the other departments?

Department of Health: Where is the proactive mental health strategy addressing trauma and the rising rates of anxiety in children?
Department of Families, Fairness and Housing: Why aren’t we seeing real early intervention models that support family stability and parent education?
NDIS and Disability Services: Why are so many neurodivergent and disabled children still denied adequate support, flexible plans, and inclusive environments

And let’s not forget the critical role of:
Universities and Training Institutions: Why are regulation and trauma-awareness not mandatory components in Early Childhood and Education degrees? The government champions inclusion, yet the very people responsible for supporting children with disabilities are graduating without the skills or qualifications to do so effectively.
The eSafety Commission – to confront the impact of social media algorithms that fuel dysregulation, bullying, and toxic comparison
Mental Health and Wellbeing – to ensure accessible, community-based services are available before children reach crisis
Housing and Homelessness – because no child can regulate when they don’t know where they’re sleeping tonight
Multicultural Affairs – to ensure responses are inclusive and sensitive to cultural contexts often ignored in punitive frameworks
Youth Justice: Why are we investing more in punitive responses than in prevention?

We cannot continue to pathologise, criminalise, and marginalise children who are struggling to cope in systems that do not meet their needs.

This is not a school issue — this is a society issue. And the sooner we respond that way, the sooner we can help kids before they break.

We need regulation, not retribution. Connection, not control.

What Will Actually Work?

Evidence from neuroscience, trauma-informed education, and somatic psychology is unequivocal:

Children can't learn, connect, or comply when their nervous system is dysregulated. (Porges, 2011, Siegel, 2012)

A reactive system that focuses on punishment only exacerbates fear, shame, and disconnection, further entrenching behavioural issues.

How Yoga Therapy Fits the Research

Before we dive into why I'm writing this blog, it’s important to understand where Yoga Therapy fits in the broader landscape of research-backed interventions.

Yoga Therapy is not an alternative to psychological or educational support — it is a complementary, somatic-based practice that aligns directly with what we now understand about trauma, neurodevelopment, and emotional regulation.

A 2014 meta-analysis published in the Journal of Developmental & Behavioral Pediatrics found that mind-body practices, including yoga, were associated with reduced anxiety, improved mood, and better behavioral regulation in children (Cochrane Review, 2014).

Further studies show that yoga-based interventions can improve executive function, attention, and classroom engagement (Butzer et al., 2016).

When delivered by trained professionals in trauma-aware, neuroaffirming ways, Yoga Therapy provides children with physical, mental, and emotional tools to regulate their nervous system. It teaches them to identify early signs of distress, shift their internal state, and reconnect with a sense of safety — all prerequisites for successful learning and social interaction.

This is the foundation The GET Co. is built on.

The GET Co: A Nervous System-First Response

This is the exact reason why I created The GET Co. — to bridge the gap between what’s happening in classrooms and what’s needed in children’s bodies.

Our Yoga Therapy programs are:

Evidence-informed: Grounded in developmental psychology, trauma research, and neuroscience
Developmentally aligned: Tailored to a child’s age, capacity, and sensory profile
Therapeutically integrated: Complementing existing supports such as OT, psychology, and education plans

We teach children how to:

🌬 Breathe through big feelings
🧠 Understand their inner world
🌀 Use movement to reset and regulate their nervous system
❤️ Rebuild trust with their peers, teachers, and themselves

This isn’t about yoga mats and calming music. It’s about:

Nervous system literacy
Trauma-aware, somatic-based tools
Creating a space where kids feel safe enough to grow

The Way Forward

If we want safer classrooms, we need smarter, sooner, systemic support. And that starts by recognising this is not an education department problem to fix alone. It’s a crisis of connection. A failure of regulation. A collective responsibility.