Table 32. Percentage of public middle schools reporting their efforts to reduce or prevent crime were limited by specified non-school-level factors, by selected school characteristics: 1999

School Survey on Crime and Safety (SSOCS)

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Table 32. Percentage of public middle schools reporting their efforts to reduce or prevent crime were limited by specified non-school-level factors, by selected school characteristics: 1999–2000

School characteristic	Teacher contracts	Inadequate funds	Fear of district or state reprisal	Federal policies on disciplining disabled students	Other federal policies on discipline and safety	State or district policies on discipline and safety	Percent of schools that did not feel they were limited in any way
All public middle schools	28	63	18	66	41	38	9

Enrollment size
Less than 300	19	50	17	50	30	29	21
300–499	25	73	20	70	50	41	6
500–999	32	66	19	70	42	40	6
1,000 or more	26	57	14	64	40	38	10

Urbanicity
City	33	62	20	65	42	41	9
Urban fringe	35	65	18	65	39	38	8
Town	17	67	18	70	51	40	7
Rural	20	61	17	65	38	33	12

Crime level where students live¹
High	38	61	34	75	45	52	3
Moderate	29	68	24	70	52	51	7
Low	25	60	14	62	37	32	11
Mixed	33	74	24	75	45	43	5

Percent minority enrollment¹
0–5 percent	26	70	17	65	39	34	8
6–20 percent	24	59	13	67	39	35	12
21–50 percent	35	67	18	70	45	42	5
More than 50 percent	27	58	25	60	42	43	10

Percent of students eligible for free/reduced-price lunch
0–20 percent	25	60	14	68	36	32	11
21–50 percent	31	70	17	65	41	35	7
More than 50 percent	25	58	25	64	47	48	10

Percent of students below 15^th percentile on standardized tests
0–5 percent	21	59	15	56	34	31	16
6–15 percent	28	63	17	69	42	37	6
More than 15 percent	33	69	23	71	46	45	8

Percent of students likely to attend college
0–35 percent	30	64	22	63	41	39	6
36–60 percent	23	63	16	68	45	42	9
More than 60 percent	30	64	17	65	38	33	12

Percent of students who consider academic achievement important
0–25 percent	35	64	22	67	42	37	8
26–50 percent	29	68	22	71	41	42	6
51–75 percent	30	62	18	65	44	39	9
More than 75 percent	22	62	15	63	38	34	12

Percent male enrollment
0–44 percent	23	55	18	58	32	32	14
45–55 percent	29	65	19	69	44	40	8
More than 55 percent	23	62	13	47	28	25	16

Student/teacher ratio¹,²
Less than 12	27	63	19	65	40	35	10
12–16	28	64	18	68	43	38	11
More than 16	29	66	16	62	39	39	7

Number of classroom changes¹
0–3 changes	20	57	19	55	42	33	21
4–6 changes	28	65	21	64	40	41	9
More than 6 changes	29	63	17	68	42	36	7

Use of paid law enforcement³
Regular use	30	65	20	68	43	40	7
No regular use	22	59	15	62	37	33	14

Number of serious discipline problems⁴
No problems	19	53	13	55	34	30	16
1 problem	26	66	16	67	41	39	9
2 problems	29	67	18	74	38	33	4
3 or more problems	41	74	28	74	54	52	3

Transfers as percentage of enrollment¹,⁵
0 to 6 percent	25	57	19	56	38	36	12
6 to 11 percent	28	62	18	66	43	39	9
11 to 21 percent	29	71	16	73	42	38	6
21 percent or more	28	64	19	68	41	39	10

Prevalence of schoolwide disruptions¹,⁶
No disruptions	26	63	18	67	40	37	9
Any disruptions	31	65	20	63	45	41	7

Percent of students absent without excuses
None	28	55	12	61	28	28	13
1–2 percent	21	62	18	65	41	39	8
3–5 percent	31	66	20	70	46	38	9
6–10 percent	34	73	22	69	53	50	8
More than 10 percent	50	63	29	54	32	32	8

Prevalence of violent incidents¹,⁷
No violent incidents	17	48	12	45	26	28	19
Any violent incidents	29	66	19	69	44	40	7
¹ 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.
² 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.
³ 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.
⁴ 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.
⁵ 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.
⁶ 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.
⁷ 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." 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.
SOURCE: U.S. Department of Education, National Center for Education Statistics, School Survey on Crime and Safety (SSOCS), 2000.

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