Skip Navigation

Download Excel Excel File (35 KB)     Download SE Excel Excel File (31 KB)

Table 5.  Number and percentage of public middle schools reporting incidents involving theft, possession of a firearm, and possession of a knife or sharp object with thenumber of incidents reported, by selected school characteristics: 1999–2000


School characteristic Theft/larceny1   Possess firearm/
explosive device2
  Possess knife or sharp object
Num-
ber of schools
Per-
cent of schools
Num-
ber of incidents
  Num-
ber of schools
Per-
cent of schools
Num-
ber of incidents
  Num-
ber of schools
Per-
cent of schools
Num-
ber of incidents
All public middle schools 9,917 65 62,628   1,483 10 2,157   8,578 56 23,118
                       
Enrollment size                      
Less than 300 1,506 56 6,759   163 6 163   1,041 38 3,058
300–499 1,899 57 9,734   165 5 237   1,442 43 2,675
500–999 5,042 69 31,331   971 13 1,407   4,660 64 12,582
1,000 or more1,471 75 14,804   184 9 349   1,434 73 4,803
                       
Urbanicity                      
City 2,501 73 20,553   402 12 770   2,364 69 6,922
Urban fringe 3,496 65 23,562   685 13 990   3,166 59 8,608
Town 1,504 61 6,275   135 5 135   1,227 50 2,684
Rural 2,417 59 12,237   262 6 262   1,821 44 4,904
                       
Crime level where students live3                      
High 539 72 4,964   183 24 241   599 79 2,161
Moderate 1,721 67 10,517   281 11 396   1,685 65 4,661
Low 6,077 62 33,581   765 8 1,111   4,697 47 11,678
Mixed 1,512 75 13,464   254 12 409   1,547 76 4,465
                       
Percent minority enrollment3                      
0–5 percent 2,484 57 10,500   282 6 383   1,915 44 3,464
6–20 percent 2,714 69 19,716   437 11 552   2,180 56 6,282
21–50 percent 2,537 73 17,009   253 7 430   1,967 56 5,945
More than 50 percent 2,111 61 14,557   496 14 777   2,444 71 7,121
                       
Percent of students eligible for free/reduced-price lunch                      
0–20 percent 3,100 67 18,138   318 7 508   2,071 45 4,156
21–50 percent 4,092 64 27,474   737 12 984   3,617 57 10,029
More than 50 percent 2,726 63 17,015   428 10 665   2,890 66 8,932
                       
Percent of students below 15th percentile on standardized tests                      
0–5 percent 2,614 62 14,653   329 8 474   1,830 43 4,156
6–15 percent 4,417 66 27,042   491 7 621   3,930 59 10,029
More than 15 percent 2,886 65 20,933   663 15 1,062   2,818 64 8,932
                       
Percent of students likely to attend college                      
0–35 percent 2,904 68 19,785   493 11 680   3,021 70 9,007
36–60 percent 3,389 60 19,167   431 8 706   2,740 48 7,500
More than 60 percent 3,624 68 23,675   559 10 771   2,817 53 6,611
                       
Percent of students who consider academic achievement important                      
0–25 percent 1,131 69 8,586   200 12 246   1,069 65 3,011
26–50 percent 2,398 72 16,721   364 11 521   2,207 66 6,992
51–75 percent 3,145 61 16,979   509 10 750   2,878 56 6,893
More than 75 percent 3,243 62 20,343   410 8 640   2,424 46 6,221
                       
Percent male enrollment                      
0–44 percent 1,000 48 7,369   125 6 209   1,063 51 2,959
45–55 percent 8,194 69 51,552   1,302 11 1,865   6,862 57 18,549
More than 55 percent 723 55 3,707   56 4 82   653 49 1,609
                       
Student/teacher ratio3,4                      
Less than 12 2,917 63 18,518   314 7 486   2,396 52 5,760
12–16 3,656 65 20,247   564 10 760   3,165 56 8,216
More than 16 2,839 66 20,506   420 10 725   2,685 63 7,899
                       
Number of classroom changes3                      
0–3 changes 396 41 918   # # #   474 49 973
4–6 changes 3,442 64 23,260   461 8 753   3,206 59 9,608
More than 6 changes 4,933 69 30,832   919 13 1,264   3,951 55 10,328
                       
Use of paid law enforcement5                      
Regular use 7,336 70 48,604   1,181 11 1,755   6,341 60 17,817
No regular use 2,581 53 14,024   302 6 401   2,236 46 5,301
                       
Number of serious discipline problems6                      
No problems 2,545 47 10,432   177 3 247   2,301 42 5,419
1 problem 2,743 73 15,867   461 12 681   1,962 52 4,912
2 problems 1,538 66 10,689   253 11 372   1,428 61 3,464
3 or more problems 3,092 82 25,639   591 16 857   2,887 76 9,322
                       
Transfers as percentage of enrollment3,7                      
0 to 6 percent 2,280 59 11,750   383 10 534   1,799 47 4,065
6 to 11 percent 2,134 64 13,829   204 6 343   1,768 52 4,932
11 to 21 percent 2,606 70 18,494   406 11 632   2,276 61 6,536
21 percent or more 2,666 67 17,428   425 11 543   2,496 63 6,975
                       
Prevalence of schoolwide disruptions3,8                      
No disruptions 7,542 64 49,114   1,106 9 1,557   6,482 54 16,609
Any disruptions 1,882 76 11,719   333 13 544   1,692 68 5,567
                       
Percent of students absent without excuses                      
None 1,646 59 8,097   244 9 324   1,195 43 2,563
1–2 percent 4,032 64 24,626   457 7 679   3,369 53 8,701
3–5 percent 2,440 67 17,506   412 11 613   2,261 62 6,326
6–10 percent 1,352 66 9,154   273 13 404   1,325 63 3,546
More than 10 percent 447 84 3,246   97 18 136   427 80 1,981
# Rounds to zero.
1 Theft/larceny (taking things over $10 without personal confrontation) was defined for respondents as, "the unlawful taking of another person's property without personal confrontation, threat, violence, or bodily harm. Included are pocket picking, stealing purse or backpack (if left unattended or no force was used to take it from owner), theft from a building, theft from a motor vehicle or motor vehicle parts or accessories, theft of bicycles, theft from vending machines, and all other types of theft."
2 Firearm/explosive device was defined as, "any weapon that is designed to (or may readily be converted to) expel a projectile by the action of an explosive. This includes guns, bombs, grenades, mines, rockets, missiles, pipe bombs, or similar devices designed to explode and capable of causing bodily harm or property damage."
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 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.
6 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.
7 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.
8 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.
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. 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.