Table 21. Percentage of public schools reporting use of selected policies to prevent or reduce violence, by selected school characteristics: 1999

School Survey on Crime and Safety (SSOCS)

Publications & Products|SSOCS & SCS Table Library|Staff

Back

Download Excel

(57 KB)

Download SE Excel

(48 KB)

Table 21. Percentage of public schools reporting use of selected policies to prevent or reduce violence, by selected school characteristics: 1999–2000

School characteristic	Training, supervision, or technical assistance in classroom management for teachers	Review, revision, or monitoring of schoolwide discipline practices and procedures	Training faculty or staff in crime prevention	Reorganizing school, grades, or schedules ¹	Architectural environmental modifications	Regularly used paid law enforcement ²
All public schools	66	90	31	25	31	52

Level
Elementary	67	89	31	20	29	37
Middle	68	92	33	44	32	68
Secondary	65	90	35	23	35	89
Combined	56	86	23	17	28	60

Enrollment size
Less than 300	56	84	27	14	27	30
300–499	66	89	28	19	28	46
500–999	71	92	34	34	33	60
1,000 or more	73	95	42	34	38	88

Urbanicity
City	76	93	43	35	33	64
Urban fringe	66	89	31	26	33	53
Town	68	92	30	25	31	49
Rural	59	86	24	17	27	42

Crime level where students live ³
High	83	96	46	43	32	69
Moderate	77	90	43	29	33	58
Low	62	88	26	21	29	46
Mixed	62	93	34	33	35	62

Percent minority enrollment³
0–5 percent	62	88	26	17	29	41
6–20 percent	59	85	24	22	29	49
21–50 percent	69	92	36	27	33	51
More than 50 percent	76	94	41	34	32	66

Percent of students eligible for free/reduced-price lunch
0–20 percent	62	90	22	20	29	50
21–50 percent	64	88	30	22	31	48
More than 50 percent	72	90	40	31	32	56

Percent of students below 15th percentile on standardized tests
0–5 percent	67	90	30	24	31	47
6–15 percent	62	88	29	20	30	51
More than 15 percent	71	92	35	32	32	57

Percent of students likely to attend college
0–35 percent	69	89	32	32	32	55
36–60 percent	64	90	31	22	29	49
More than 60 percent	67	90	31	22	31	52

Percent of students who consider academic achievement important
0–25 percent	67	87	29	32	36	62
26–50 percent	64	90	28	22	28	49
51–75 percent	67	90	33	27	31	58
More than 75 percent	67	90	33	23	31	46

Percent male enrollment
0–44 percent	75	89	34	31	31	53
45–55 percent	65	89	29	23	31	52
More than 55 percent	65	91	41	32	31	47

Student/teacher ratio³,⁴
Less than 12	62	87	29	21	31	47
12–16	69	91	36	25	32	56
More than 16	68	92	29	27	30	54

Number of classroom changes³
0–3 changes	68	89	36	24	28	38
4–6 changes	68	90	30	25	32	51
More than 6 changes	64	90	30	28	32	65

Use of paid law enforcement²
Regular use	71	93	36	32	36	100
No regular use	62	86	26	18	25	†

Number of serious discipline problems ⁵
No problems	63	88	29	19	28	41
1 problem	70	92	32	28	34	64
2 problems	64	92	37	33	34	62
3 or more problems	74	93	35	40	36	73

Transfers as percentage of enrollment³,⁶
0 to 6 percent	60	88	27	21	24	51
6 to 11 percent	71	88	35	24	31	52
11 to 21 percent	69	90	32	24	34	49
21 percent or more	66	91	33	29	33	52

Prevalence of schoolwide disruptions³,⁷
No disruptions	66	89	31	24	31	49
Any disruptions	65	93	34	30	32	77

Percent of students absent without excuses
None	59	85	23	18	25	39
1–2 percent	65	89	29	24	31	47
3–5 percent	73	91	36	28	34	56
6–10 percent	66	93	38	27	32	74
More than 10 percent	74	94	49	37	28	69

Prevalence of violent incidents³,⁸
No violent incidents	64	85	34	19	26	35
Any violent incidents	67	91	30	28	33	58
† Not applicable.
¹ For example, schools within a school, "houses" or "teams" of students.
² Schools were included as regularly using paid law enforcement if they reported the use of paid law enforcement during any of the following times: at any time during school hours, while students were arriving or leaving, at selected school activities (e.g., athletic and social events, open houses, science fairs), or at any other time that the respondent specified.
³ Some schools are omitted from these categories because of missing data on their school characteristics. For this reason, the detailed results do not sum to the totals. See appendix J of 2000 School Survey on Crime and Safety (SSOCS) Detailed Data Documentation (NCES 2004-307) for further information.
⁴ Student/teacher ratio was calculated by dividing the total number of students enrolled in the school by the total number of full-time equivalent teachers. The total number of full-time equivalent teachers is a combination of the full-time and part-time teachers, including special education teachers, with an adjustment to compensate for the part-time status.
⁵ Serious discipline problems is a count of discipline problems reported by principals. These discipline problems include student racial tensions, student bullying, student verbal abuse of teachers, widespread disorder in classrooms, and student acts of disrespect for teachers. If a principal reported that any of these problems occurred daily or weekly in their school, each was counted once in the total number of serious discipline problems. Undesirable gang activities and undesirable cult or extremist group activities were also counted once as a problem if the principal reported that these events occurred at all in their school.
⁶ Transfers as a percentage of enrollment combines the number of students who were transferred to a school and the number of students who were transferred from a school, divided by the total number of students enrolled in the school.
⁷ Schoolwide disruptions include actions that disrupted school activities such as bomb threats or anthrax threats. Respondents were instructed to exclude all fire alarms, including false alarms.
⁸ Violent incidents include rape, sexual battery other than rape, physical attack or fight with or without a weapon, threat of physical attack with or without a weapon, and robbery with or without a weapon.
NOTE: Detail may not sum to totals because of rounding. "At school/at your school" was defined for respondents as including activities happening in school buildings, on school grounds, on school buses, and at places that are holding school-sponsored events or activities. Respondents were instructed to, unless the survey specified otherwise, only respond for those times that were during normal school hours or when school activities/events were in session. A gang was defined for respondents as, "an ongoing loosely organized association of three or more persons, whether formal or informal, that has a common name, signs, symbols or colors, whose members engage, either individually or collectively, in violent or other forms of illegal behavior." Elementary schools are defined as schools in which the lowest grade is not higher than grade 3 and the highest grade is not higher than grade 8. Middle schools are defined as schools in which the lowest grade is not lower than grade 4 and the highest grade is not higher than grade 9. Secondary schools are defined as schools in which the lowest grade is not lower than grade 9 and the highest grade is not higher than grade 12. Combined schools include all other combinations of grades, including K–12 schools.
SOURCE: U.S. Department of Education, National Center for Education Statistics, School Survey on Crime and Safety (SSOCS), 2000.

Back

Download Excel

(57 KB)

Download SE Excel

(48 KB)