State law (Revised Code of Washington [RCW] 28A.320.130) requires the Office of Superintendent of Public Instruction (OSPI) to annually report to the Legislature the number of incidents in violation of RCW 9.41.280, which involves the possession of weapons on school premises, transportation systems, or in areas of facilities while being used…

Over the past 25 years school violence in the form of active shootings has steadily increased in frequency and devastation. Schools across the United States have leveraged a multitude of security mechanisms and philosophies to stop active shooter violence. The 2020 COVID pandemic further ignited violence within the schools and a rise in teacher…

Context: School-based student protests have received little scholarly attention, yet they have the potential to impact the school community, students' civic development, and larger social movements. Principals are key actors in responding to school-based student protests. As school leaders, principals' actions affect the outcome of student…

The issue of school safety is of paramount concern but what is lacking is clarity on the best course of action aimed at bolstering safety in public schools. We sought to answer the following research questions: What topics are addressed in school board policies related to arming employees? What outlying policy topics are addressed in school board…

Between 1999 and 2018, 210 shootings have occurred on public school campuses in the United States. The increased need for security and student support may crowd out instructional resources post-shooting. Shootings may also cause students, especially those from socioeconomically advantaged backgrounds, to move away, leading to declines in…

This document is the first of a semi-annual "stocktaking" publication to analyze various political trends impacting education and young people. Bellwether hopes to help the field separate signal from noise and provide context around various issues and trends affecting the sector. The impact of COVID-19 school closures on schools and…

Theories abound on why school shootings occur. Current literature centers on shooter profiles and rarely focuses on where the shootings occur. This study investigates the relationship between impoverished schools and if those schools are more likely to experience a school shooting than non-impoverished schools. Four factors of poverty were…

The purpose of the study was to analyze the historical patterns in the relationship between specific types of disabilities and frequency of drug abuse or weapon offenses in public schools in the United States using the U.S. Department of Education Open Data Platform's (n.d.) data sets from 2011-2012 through 2020-2021. The problem is that students…

Public schools in southern Thailand have witnessed a sharp decline in school enrollment and have struggled to remain open due to an ongoing separatist insurgency since 2004. The purpose of this sequential exploratory mixed methods research is to examine the current situation and the psychosocial factors impacting public school enrollment in…

Using data from the School Survey on Crime and Safety (SSOCS), this report presents findings both on crime and violence in U.S. public schools and on the practices and programs schools have used to promote school safety. SSOCS is managed by the National Center for Education Statistics (NCES) within the U.S. Department of Education's Institute of…

Historically, students of color have experienced an increased risk for exclusionary discipline outcomes (Children's Defense Fund, 1975). Discipline disproportionality continues to be a major problem in our schools today (McIntosh et al., 2018). The focus of most of the research has been on African American males; however, African American females…

The federal Gun-Free Schools Act (GFSA) enacted in1994 requires U.S. public school systems to report any incident of a student bringing a firearm to school or being in possession of a firearm on school property, the law applies to all states and jurisdictions funded under the Elementary and Secondary Education Act (ESEA) of 1965. Under federal…

U.S. public school students increasingly attend schools with sworn law enforcement officers present. Yet, little is known about how these school resource officers (SROs) affect school environments or student outcomes. Our study uses a fuzzy regression discontinuity (RD) design with national school-level data from 2014 to 2018 to estimate the…

This is the 25th edition of Indicators of School Crime and Safety. This report provides summary statistics to inform the nation about current aspects of crime and safety in schools. This report does so by highlighting selected findings from 23 indicators on various school crime and safety topics. By synthesizing findings in this way, the report…

This is the 24th in a series of annual publications. Beginning with the 2020 edition, this report has been redesigned with the intention of increasing its usability for a wider audience. This report does so by highlighting selected findings from 23 indicators on various school crime and safety topics. It first examines different types of student…