Little research exists that examines the exercise of discretion by principals in their disciplinary decision making. This study sought to understand the application of values by principals as they engage in student disciplinary decision making within legally fixed parameters of their administrative discretion. This qualitative methodology used…

Drawing on nine focus groups with secondary students in southern Ontario, we investigated secondary students' perceptions of, and experiences with, school codes of conduct and their application. While generally supporting the "big" rules such as no weapons, students engaged more critically with minor ones. We drew on Foucault's…

Surveyed Canadian dental school students and faculty and found that students gave equal or more lenient penalties than faculty for the same academic offense; extenuating circumstances introduced via case presentations altered penalty choice only slightly; and offenses could be grouped to correspond with appropriate penalties, thereby establishing…

A study of junior high schools (MacDonald 1995) found that students and administrators held significantly different perceptions regarding the nature, extent, and management of violent behaviors. This paper presents findings of a study conducted 1 year later that more thoroughly examined students' perceptions of the effectiveness of current school…

Research on school violence has slowly gained momentum in Canada, underscoring the concern some educators are expressing about the frequency of behaviors that seriously disrupt student learning. This paper presents findings of a study that compared students' and administrators' perceptions of the nature, extent, awareness, and management of…

This paper introduces a project that sought to examines students' perceptions of the meaning of school violence, its impact on their schooling experience, and the effectiveness of current strategies for dealing with violent behaviors. Interviews were conducted with 60 students in grades 7-9 (in groups of 12) drawn from 5 K-9 schools in central…

Presents 15 teachers' viewpoints on discipline; parent, teacher, and student thoughts on the causes of discipline problems; a federal discipline policy statement; a list of common discipline problems; eight questions to ask when exploring practical solutions; and approaches to discipline problems. (AH)

This paper offers an overview of three previous studies based on surveys of almost 1000 Ontario parents, 3500 teachers, and over 6100 students; each of which monitors the participants' experience with and attitudes towards the system of education. The intention of the overview is to assimilate the findings of the previous research into a single…