New South Wales' schools and authorities are grappling with random violence in the playground, data suggests, with more than 1,000 incidents reported last year.
The ABC reviewed the NSW Government's most recent figures, after vision emerged earlier this week of an alleged one-punch attack at Wagga Wagga High School, which is the subject of a police investigation.
In the video, a student can be seen punching another boy in the head. The victim appears unsteady on his feet and then falls to the ground.
That incident was not isolated.
NSW Government documents detail hundreds of attacks at schools last year, including one in which a boy punched several schoolgirls in the back of the head before pinning another student to the ground.
The report said three staff members were needed to pull him from the victim.
In another incident, a schoolgirl punched a female classmate in the head, giving her a bloody nose, while another student filmed the altercation.
Where are the hotspots?
The Eastern Creek area, near Mt Druitt in Sydney's west, topped the list of Term 4, 2016 assaults with 16, while the areas of Wyong and Nirimba both had 11.
Eight violent incidents were reported in schools in the Wagga area for the same period.
The top eight areas in NSW for Term 4, 2016 for incidents were:
| Rank | Area | Violent incidents |
| 1. | Eastern Creek | 16 |
| 2. | Wyong | 11 |
| 3. | Nirimba | 11 |
| 4. | Tamworth | 10 |
| 5. | Wollongong | 10 |
| 6. | Penrith | 9 |
| 7. | South Coast | 9 |
| 8. | Wagga Wagga | 8 |
In total, the Education Department's reports recorded more than 1,000 serious violent incidents in 2016 in NSW schools.
This data is grouped into sub-regions called "Principal Networks", and individual reports on each of the state's 2,200 schools are not published.
The reports do not capture any minor incidents not reported by principals.
An Education Department spokesperson told the ABC it had a "zero-tolerance policy towards violence, bullying or any other form of harassment" in schools and when warranted, it supported criminal investigations into serious incidents.
The department said statistics showed on average one violent incident per 1,000 students in the Wagga Wagga area, declining a request for detailed data on individual schools.
Historical studies by the Bureau of Crime Statistics suggests that in a system of more than 780,000 students, the level of violence relative to the population was relatively low.
