Because before a student disengages, refuses school, shuts down, lashes out, withdraws, or disappears from learning, there is usually something happening underneath. Stress. Dysregulation. Distress. Disconnection. A lack of belonging. A growing sense that school no longer feels safe, manageable or meaningful.

And one of the clearest places this shows up is behaviour.

This is where the national conversation needs to get sharper.

Too often, behaviour is still being treated as something to manage, contain or correct before it is properly understood. But behaviour is often communication. It can be the first visible sign that something is not right. It can reflect overwhelm, unmet need, emotional load, relational rupture or a young person’s struggle to cope with pressures that adults have not yet fully seen.

The uncomfortable question for schools is this:

Are we truly lifting the lid on behaviour?
Or are we still responding to what is easiest to see, while missing what matters most?

Because if we are serious about addressing disengagement across Australia, we cannot keep having surface-level conversations about behaviour. We have to ask what sits beneath it. We have to ask whether our schools have the language, the confidence, the shared understanding and the systems to recognise these signals earlier. And we have to ask whether we are doing this well enough, consistently enough, and early enough — not in isolated classrooms, but across whole-school settings and at scale.

Hosted by Gemma McLean, and featuring Nikki Bonus, Andrew Pearn, Claudia Bou-melheim, Stephanie Giles, and Dr Rachel Baffsky this webinar brings together neuroscience, educator voice, practical school insight and re-engagement expertise to examine one of the most urgent issues in education right now: whether schools are truly equipped to understand the behaviour that sits on the path to disengagement.

This is not just a webinar about behaviour.
It is a webinar about what behaviour is trying to tell us before a child disconnects further.
Before attendance drops.
Before school refusal deepens.
Before a student slips through the cracks.

What this session will explore

  • why behaviour is often a communication of dysregulation, distress or disconnection
  • what may sit beneath the behaviours schools are working hardest to manage
  • how anxiety, overwhelm, emotional load and lack of belonging can show up through behaviour
  • why behaviour must be part of the national conversation about disengagement, attendance decline and school refusal
  • what it takes to move from reactive behaviour response to deeper, earlier and more relational practice
  • whether schools are building the shared language, visibility and whole-school response needed to do this well at scale

This session is for educators, school leaders and wellbeing teams who know that what is showing up in classrooms is often part of a much bigger story — and who want to be better equipped to recognise it, respond to it and stop the gap from widening.

Because if behaviour is one of the earliest warning signs that a young person is struggling, then schools cannot afford to keep responding at the surface. Not when disengagement is rising. Not when distress is growing. Not when so many students are telling us, in different ways, that something underneath is not okay.

Register here to receive the recording
Gemma McLean
VP Digital Sales at TTEC Digital

Gems McLean is a passionate advocate for student wellbeing, equity, and the power of technology in education. As the VP Digital Sales at TTEC Digital, she is dedicated to ensuring no learner is left behind. Her journey has been anything but traditional. Despite being told she would never amount to anything and facing significant challenges in her school years—including an undiagnosed neurodivergence and growing up in a household affected by mental health struggles—she has built a career that proves otherwise. Without finishing high school or attending university, she has navigated a path that led her from the world of EdTech to Amazon Web Services and now at TTEC Digital. More than just a leader in edtech, she is a mentor, a champion for diversity and inclusion, and someone who deeply believes in the power of kindness and community. She sees people for who they are and strives to elevate, encourage, and empower them to recognise their own strengths. Her personal story fuels her mission: to ensure that no student slips through the cracks and that every young person is seen, supported, and given the opportunities they deserve. Her superpower? Using her lived experience to help others uncover theirs.

Nikki Bonus
CEO & Founder of Life Skills GO

Nikki Bonus is an Australian founder, educator, keynote speaker and education technology innovator who has spent more than two decades working inside Australian schools to ensure every child is seen, safe, heard, connected and capable — regardless of background, identity, postcode or circumstance.


She is the Founder and CEO of Life Skills GO, an Australian-built, AI-powered early identification, engagement, learning and school improvement platform. Life Skills GO gives schools and the support networks around them real-time visibility of what may be preventing students from attending, participating, belonging and learning — automatically surfacing the right evidence to the right person at the right time, without adding to educator workload.
The platform's purpose is clear: to connect information, reduce unnecessary burden on schools, and equip educators and decision-makers with the evidence they need to act earlier. Because earlier action changes outcomes. Belonging drives engagement. Engagement drives attendance. Attendance drives attainment.


Life Skills GO was not designed from the outside. It was built from the ground up over nine years, co-designed in direct partnership with more than 1,000 Australian schools — shaped by students, teachers, school leaders, wellbeing teams, psychologists, cognitive neuroscientists, child development experts, learning support staff, families and carers. This multidisciplinary foundation — spanning data analysis, education design, cognitive neuroscience, child development and research evaluation — ensures the platform is grounded in evidence, tested in practice and built to generate insights that are meaningful at the classroom, school and system level.


Nikki came to this work not as a technologist, but as a practitioner. For 15 years before founding Life Skills GO, she worked directly inside schools delivering social-emotional learning programs. The problem Life Skills GO was built to solve was not identified from a distance — it was surfaced from within. Students needed a structured, safe way to communicate what they were experiencing. Teachers needed real-time visibility of patterns forming beneath the surface. Wellbeing teams needed earlier signals before situations escalated to crisis. Leaders needed whole-school trend data to inform resourcing, planning and improvement. Families needed a clearer picture of their child — not just academic results or behaviour incidents.


At scale, Life Skills GO gives schools the infrastructure to see what is unfolding in a student's world before it becomes a crisis — to understand why it may be happening, and to know what to do next. It enables evidence to inform not only individual support, but whole-school improvement and the broader network of people working around every child.


The platform was built with more than 1,000 Australian schools across government, Catholic, independent, specialist and hospital settings. Its 15 million student check-in responses represent one of the largest real-time evidence bases on student wellbeing ever assembled in this country — with state-by-state data published openly by jurisdiction.


Nikki's conviction has not changed since the beginning: no child should fall through the cracks because of the circumstances they were born into. Every child can thrive when they are met with the right environment, the right skills, the right support and the right tools at the right time. Life Skills GO exists to make that possible — consistently, equitably and at scale.

Stephanie Giles
Deputy Principal at Guildford West Public School

Stephanie Giles has been working in the area of Special Education and Learning Support for 15 years and holds a Bachelor of Education and Masters of Special Education. She is currently the Deputy Principal at Guildford West Public School, with her role focused primarily on wellbeing as well as on overseeing the school's Learning Support Team. This involves supporting students with social and emotional difficulties, mental health disorders, complex learning needs, diagnosed disabilities, learning difficulties and trauma. She has worked across special education and mainstream settings and is passionate about supporting student wellbeing and enhancing learning opportunities for all students in the areas of social and emotional learning.

Claudia Bou-melhem
Director of Wellbeing and Engagement K-12

I am an experienced leader with a background across curriculum, wellbeing and whole‑school improvement in multiple school settings. I am currently completing a Master of Educational Leadership, which continues to shape and strengthen my practice. Recently, I have led the development of a strategic Engagement Framework for students, staff, and parents, and co‑created a comprehensive Student Wellbeing Framework for our College. My work is centred on building consistent, relational systems that enhance belonging, emotional safety, and engagement across the whole school community.

Andrew Pearn
Deputy Principal Wellbeing

Educator who has worked in both Government and Catholic education during the past 20 years, leading whole school improvement initiatives. Passionate about improving the wellbeing and learning outcomes of students and staff alike, by creating safe and supportive educational environments, that focus on the interconnection between Academia, Faith, Wellbeing and Extracurricular opportunities

Dr Rachel Baffsky

Postdoctoral Research Fellow

Dr Rachel Baffsky is a Postdoctoral Research Fellow, funded by Suicide Prevention Australia, at the Black Dog Institute. Her research uses implementation science and co-design approaches to optimise youth mental health prevention in schools. Currently, she manages an MRFF-funded trial of a new, universal self-harm prevention intervention in NSW primary schools. She is also developing a complementary web-based resource for parents to support self-harm prevention in children.

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