Behaviour Support Plans in Victorian Schools: What They Are, Who Writes Them, and How to Make Sure They Work

Your child has behaviours at school that are affecting their learning and sometimes their safety. The school has mentioned a "behaviour support plan." You're not sure what this document actually is, who has the authority to write it, whether it's legally binding, or what you can do when the school isn't following it.

Here's a grounded breakdown of behaviour support plans in Victorian government schools.

What Is a Behaviour Support Plan?

In a Victorian school context, a Behaviour Support Plan (BSP) is a documented, individualized plan that describes:

• The behaviours of concern (specifically and without value judgment — not "defiant" but "leaves the classroom without permission three or more times per day")
• The functions of those behaviours — what the student is communicating or trying to achieve (escape, sensory regulation, attention, access to preferred activities)
• Environmental or antecedent factors that contribute to the behaviours (sensory triggers, transition warnings, unstructured time, specific classroom arrangements)
• Proactive strategies to reduce the likelihood of the behaviours occurring
• Teaching replacement skills — functional alternatives to the behaviour of concern
• Response strategies — how staff should respond if the behaviour occurs
• Crisis response steps if the behaviour escalates to a level that creates safety risks

A good BSP is written in positive, functional terms. It is not a discipline policy and it is not a punishment schedule. Its purpose is to understand what the behaviour is communicating and to teach the student more effective ways to meet the same underlying need.

Who Writes a BSP in Victoria?

BSPs in Victorian government schools should ideally be developed collaboratively by:

• The classroom teacher (who observes the behaviour most consistently)
• An education support (ES) officer if one works with the student regularly
• The student wellbeing coordinator or inclusion coordinator
• Where available, a DET school psychologist or visiting teacher with expertise in behaviour support
• Allied health professionals — particularly behaviour support practitioners funded through the NDIS if the student has an NDIS plan, or OTs with sensory and behaviour expertise
• The parents/carers, who understand the student's patterns, history, and effective strategies better than anyone in the school
• The student themselves, where developmentally appropriate

Under DET policy, students supported by Disability Inclusion funding with significant behaviours of concern should have a BSP developed through the Student Support Group (SSG). The BSP should be reviewed at each SSG meeting — at minimum once per term — and updated as strategies are evaluated.

The Relationship Between a BSP and the IEP

A Behaviour Support Plan and an Individual Education Plan (IEP) are distinct documents, but they are closely related. The BSP addresses the specific behaviours of concern. The IEP may contain goals related to the student's social-emotional learning, self-regulation, or communication development that directly inform the BSP.

In practice, many Victorian schools incorporate behaviour support goals into the IEP itself, rather than maintaining a completely separate BSP document. Both approaches are acceptable under DET policy, provided the functional behaviour assessment and the proactive strategies are documented clearly and known to all staff working with the student.

The Key Principle: Positive Behaviour Support

Victorian DET policy on student behaviour is grounded in Positive Behaviour Support (PBS) principles. This means:

• Consequences-focused approaches (detention, loss of privileges) are not a substitute for understanding and addressing the function of behaviour
• Schools are expected to teach replacement skills, not just suppress behaviours
• Restrictive practices (physical restraint, seclusion, suspension for students with disability) are subject to specific legal obligations and should be minimized and properly documented

If a school's "behaviour support plan" consists primarily of consequences and escalation steps without any proactive strategies or replacement skill teaching, it is not an adequate BSP under DET policy.

Parents can request at the SSG that the BSP explicitly includes:

1. A brief functional behaviour assessment (what triggers the behaviour, what function it serves)
2. At least three proactive environmental adjustments
3. A named replacement skill the student is being taught
4. A specific staff response protocol that is consistent across all teachers

When a BSP Isn't Being Followed

The most common complaint families raise is that the BSP exists on paper but classroom teachers don't follow it. This is an IEP compliance issue as much as a behaviour issue — and the escalation pathway is the same.

Step 1: Contact the classroom teacher directly via email, referencing a specific instance where the BSP strategy wasn't used and asking how to ensure consistency going forward. Keep the tone collaborative: "I noticed X wasn't implemented last Tuesday — can we look at what happened?"

Step 2: If non-compliance continues, escalate to the school principal via SSG. Request an urgent SSG meeting specifically to review BSP implementation fidelity. Ask the principal to confirm how the BSP is communicated to all teachers working with the student.

Step 3: If the principal does not take action, escalate to the DET Regional Office for your area (North Western, North Eastern, South Western, or South Eastern Victoria Region). Document all previous attempts to resolve the issue in writing.

Step 4: For persistent, serious non-compliance — particularly if the student has been harmed, repeatedly excluded, or placed in unacceptable situations due to staff not following the plan — consider a formal complaint through the DET Complaints and Improvement Unit or the Independent Office for School Dispute Resolution.

A Note on Suspension and Disability

Victoria has specific legal obligations regarding the suspension of students with disability. Under the Disability Standards for Education 2005, schools must make reasonable adjustments rather than defaulting to exclusionary discipline for behaviours that are connected to a student's disability.

If your child has been suspended, particularly repeatedly, and the behaviours that led to the suspension are connected to their disability, this warrants formal scrutiny. Suspensions should be accompanied by documented evidence that the school has a current BSP and has made reasonable adjustments to prevent recurrence — not just respond to incidents.

Behaviour support plans are only as useful as the systems around them. If your child's BSP isn't being implemented consistently across all staff, that's a documented failure to provide reasonable adjustments — and it's escalable. The Victoria Disability Support Blueprint includes SSG escalation scripts, documentation templates, and a behaviour support goal-writing guide aligned to the Victorian Curriculum and DET's Positive Behaviour Support framework.

See more Australia guides →