The overarching goal of schools is to create a safe, supportive environment where students can thrive and learn. This begins with a dedication to students' social and emotional well-being, and effective policies and programs that create a culture of trust. Such a culture provides an optimal learning environment, and is also a proactive step…

Gang affiliation is not something that students leave behind when they come to school. Gang members do not leave their behaviors, attitudes, and conflicts outside the school environment. Gangs, unchecked and unidentified in a school setting, often engage in threat and intimidation; physical and cyber bullying; fighting; recruiting; and criminal…

This guidebook provides information for caseworkers who investigate allegations of abuse, neglect, financial exploitation and who also provide ongoing case management and follow-up with victims of abuse. The program focuses on caseworkers' attitudes and their knowledge and skills in dealing with abusers, particularly abusers who are chemically…

This booklet presents the statement of the United States Catholic Conference on the topic of violence in society and how as a nation and as individuals people must work to ensure a more peaceful world. The booklet addresses the need for a moral revolution and a renewed ethic of justice, responsibility, and community. Several examples of renewal…

Now more than ever, counselors, teachers, community youth workers, and parents are striving to prevent individual and school-wide tragedy before it happens. Critical to the success of their efforts is a deep respect for the adolescent experience. In this book, author and social worker Michael Ungar takes a fresh, hopeful approach to challenging…

Because of escalating violence in our nation's schools and neighborhoods, childhood aggression is receiving intense public scrutiny. This article offers a systemic perspective for understanding the pervasive problem of bullying and victimization by clarifying adult attitudes toward childhood aggression; by reviewing the familial, educational, and…

Current educational and juvenile justice systems rely greatly on punishment and power over strategies-- especially when faced with youth whose severe behaviors escalate to violence. This book attempts to go beyond the typical problem-focused book, offering field-tested, concrete prevention and intervention strategies that can be used to help even…

More than half of runaway adolescents cite poor family communication and conflict as the primary reasons for running. Runaways (.5-1.5 million annually) generally arrive on the streets with few survival skills and little money. They are often subject to abuse of various sorts, and many eventually resort to criminal activity or use drugs in efforts…

Children are threatened, teased, taunted, and tormented by schoolyard bullies every day in the nation's schools. In a study of junior high and high school students from small Midwestern towns, 88 percent of students reported having observed bullying, and 76.8 percent indicated that they had been a victim of bullying at school. Bullying can…

The increasingly serious nature of juvenile criminal behavior has led to greater efforts to understand the roots, causes, and correlates of juvenile violence and chronic delinquency, as well as develop more effective means of identifying at-risk youth and treating serious and violent juvenile offenders. This book examines the realities and…

This bulletin provides suggestions for the components of a comprehensive approach to reducing student vandalism on college and university campuses. Numerous facets of the problem are addressed, including: the association of binge drinking with vandalism and school policies that tolerate or even facilitate binge drinking; a school's drinking…

This book examines why so many young people in foster care appear angry and show disrespect toward authority. Such antisocial behavior has its roots in the despair that children feel when they are abused, neglected, or abandoned by their parents or other caregivers. The book emphasizes and focuses upon the early recognition and treatment of this…

Describes a positive approach to preventing and reducing violence in Hawaiian schools that focuses on building a set of social and emotional strengths that serve to preclude or inhibit the occurrence of antisocial behavior. Components of this approach include connecting with family and peers, promoting emotional literacy, cognitive behavioral…

Middle school educators can help prevent violence with a three-step approach: ensuring an orderly and attractive physical environment, a safe social environment, and clear expectations for student behavior. Students can be taught how to constructively manage their own anger. School safety begins before conflict begins and should continue through…

A public health model of prevention and intervention is applied to violent, aggressive, and antisocial student behaviors. Stressed is secondary prevention through school intervention by such means as comprehensive school planning, behavioral management strategies, student supervision, and providing for prosocial activity. Primary and tertiary…