Title: Promoting Safety in Schools: International Experience and Action Series: Monograph (6 x 9) Author: Bureau of Justice Assistance Published: August 2001 Subject: school safety, international statistics and issues 64 pages 135,168 bytes ---------------------------- Figures, charts, forms, and tables are not included in this ASCII plain-text file. To view this document in its entirety, download the Adobe Acrobat graphic file available from this Web site or order a print copy from BJA at 800-688-4252. ---------------------------- U.S. Department of Justice Office of Justice Programs Bureau of Justice Assistance Promoting Safety in Schools International Experience and Action BJA Bureau of Justice Assistance Monograph CRIME PREVENTION SERIES #3 ---------------------------- U.S. Department of Justice Office of Justice Programs 810 Seventh Street NW. Washington, DC 20531 John Ashcroft Attorney General Office of Justice Programs World Wide Web Home Page www.ojp.usdoj.gov Bureau of Justice Assistance World Wide Web Home Page www.ojp.usdoj.gov/BJA For grant and funding information contact U.S. Department of Justice Response Center 1-800-421-6770 This document was prepared by the Center for Effective Public Policy, under grant number 95-DD-BX-K001, awarded by the Bureau of Justice Assistance, Office of Justice Programs, U.S. Department of Justice. The opinions, findings, and conclusions or recommendations expressed in this document are those of the authors and do not necessarily represent the official position or policies of the U.S. Department of Justice. The Bureau of Justice Assistance is a component of the Office of Justice Programs, which also includes the Bureau of Justice Statistics, the National Institute of Justice, the Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention, and the Office for Victims of Crime. ---------------------------- Promoting Safety in Schools International Experience and Action August 2001 NCJ 186937 Prepared by Margaret Shaw International Centre for the Prevention of Crime ---------------------------- Acknowledgments This monograph was prepared for the Bureau of Justice Assistance by Margaret Shaw, with the assistance of Kathie Oginsky, and the help and knowledge of Bernard Arsenault, Frantz Denat, Lily-Ann Gauthier, Daniel Sansfaon, Claude Vezina, and Irvin Waller at the International Centre for the Prevention of Crime. We would like to thank all those in the United States who gave advice on the development of the project and acted as an advisory group, including Janet Chiancone and Kellie Dressler Tetrick at the Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention, Jane Grady at the Center for the Study and Prevention of Violence, Paul Kingery at the Hamilton Fish Institute, Wesley Mitchell at the Los Angeles School Police Department, Colleen Minson at the National Crime Prevention Council, Bill Modzeleski at the U.S. Department of Education, Ronald Stephens at the National School Safety Center, Bill Bond at the National Association of Secondary School Principals, and Principal Steven Edwards of East Hartford High School in Connecticut. We would also like to thank the many people outside the United States who provided information and assistance for the project, in particular Francine Charlebois and the National Crime Prevention Centre in Canada; Wendy Taylor and Michael Kennedy in British Columbia; Fritz Prior in the Netherlands; Marie-France David in France; Lesley and John Noaks, John Pitts, and Samantha Leahy in the United Kingdom; and Dorothy Mdhuli and Margaret Roper in South Africa. Finally, we gratefully acknowledge the support and advice of Patrick Coleman, former Deputy Director at the Bureau of Justice Assistance, during the development of the monograph. ---------------------------- Contents I. Introduction o America Is Not Alone o Audience for This Monograph o How Can This Happen? o What Should Happen? II. The Problem and the Trends o Scope of the Problem o Safety Issues for Girls and Boys o Social Exclusion, Minorities, Hate Crimes, and Harassment o Safety Concerns o Overall View of School Violence III. International Developments o European Initiatives o Initiatives Beyond Europe o Trends in Approaches to School Safety IV. Critical Elements of a Comprehensive Approach to School Safety o From School Violence to School Safety o Interventions With Unintended Consequences o Earlier Intervention o What Works o Developing Comprehensive Approaches o Other Support o Summary V. What To Look Out For VI. Examples From Practice o Clustering Schools o Changing the Whole School and Community o Conflict Resolution Plus o Provincewide Programs o National Programs VII. Notes VIII. Bibliography/References IX. Resources and Addresses X. For More Information ---------------------------- I. Introduction ---------------------------- Despite the prevalence of gun carrying in schools, school shootings still remain relatively rare events. Since 1992, approximately 190 shootings have occurred in American schools (both student and faculty/staff). While clearly a serious issue, it must be noted that these 190 school-related deaths represent only about 1 percent of all youths killed by guns at the present. --The Youth Violence Problem, Fact Sheet, Center for the Study and Prevention of Violence, 1999b ---------------------------- America Is Not Alone America is not alone in its concern with school violence and school safety. Countries as far apart as Australia, Belgium, France, South Africa, and the United Kingdom have, in recent years, experienced tragic events in schools that have alarmed communities and governments alike. Schools and school safety have become the focus of much attention and action. The tragic deaths of pupils at Columbine High School in Littleton, Colorado, in April 1999, at Buell Elementary School in Flint, Michigan, in February 2000; at W.R. Myers High School in Taber, Alberta, Canada, in 1999; the killing of a teacher and 16 pupils by an intruder at Dunblane primary school in Scotland in 1996; and the killing of Headmaster Philip Lawrence in London, England, in 1995 have underlined a number of things. They have shown that violent events can happen both in and outside the school community; in elementary, middle, and high schools; in urban, suburban, and rural communities; among young children and teenagers; and to both pupils and staff. These events have had a profound impact, resulting in policies and programs that aim to protect students and prevent the occurrence of such tragedies. New legislation, initiatives, organizations, and centers have emerged with the specific purpose of ensuring safety in schools. The tragic events have also distorted reality. Schools remain safe places. Young people are generally at greater risk outside their schools than inside. In the United States, less than 1 percent of all youth killed by guns since 1992 have been in school or at school-related functions.[1] But school safety is also about less traumatic events, such as bullying, aggression, intimidation, and exclusion. These can also have serious short- and long-term consequences for children by affecting their willingness to stay in school, their academic achievement, their future job skills, and their social relationships. School safety is about having plans in place to prevent crises and to deal with those that arise. It is about having day-to-day practices that reduce violence and intimidation, providing safe places for victims, and responding swiftly to perpetrators. School safety involves more than simply building fences, installing television cameras or metal detectors, and expelling violent students. Prevention involves a widening range of approaches and offers many tangible rewards. Audience for This Monograph This monograph brings together information on school safety trends, policies, and projects from various countries around the world. It has been written for school principals, superintendents, administrators, boards of governors, school-parent bodies, and others in leadership positions who are concerned about school safety issues. It discusses the range of approaches that are being developed and adapted in different countries. The most successful approaches are those that see the school within their community. They focus not just on aggressive or violent incidents but also on health, use a range of policies and programs, and consider not only the roles and needs of individual pupils but also those of teachers, support staff, administrators, school operations, families, and the community around the school. They use a community-based approach to promoting school safety. How Can This Happen? "How can this happen?" seems to be the universal response when someone is killed or injured in a school. In Dunblane, Scotland, and Taber, Alberta, it led to task force reports and subsequent activity asking both why it happened and what could be done to ensure future school safety (Alberta, 2000). ---------------------------- Two Hurt in Teenage Shootout New Orleans: Two teenage boys shot and wounded each other with the same gun during a fight at their middle school yesterday after a 13-year-old expelled student slipped the weapon to one of them through a fence . . . . Witnesses said the eighth graders had argued before the shootings at the school where students must pass through a metal detector to enter . . . . The boy accused of providing the handgun was arrested . . . at his home in a nearby housing project, part of an economically mixed neighborhood . . . . The school recently expelled the boy for fighting . . . . --Associated Press, September 27, 2000 ---------------------------- Until recently, school safety activities in many countries consisted largely of school-police liaison work and some protection of school property from vandalism or intrusion. The initial response after a serious event has been to increase security by hiring guards, installing fences and television cameras, and searching lockers. There has also been an increase in the immediate suspension of students using violence or in possession of guns or drugs. Media responses to these events have helped increase awareness of problems, but also have raised levels of fear and led to overreaction. There is a general concern that violence by young people has increased, which has been substantiated by police reports in many countries from the late 1980s. Demographic changes and migration in European countries and the exclusion of whole populations from the benefits of a good education, jobs, and social services have all contributed to concerns with violence in and around schools. Reports of school violence have risen, and much of this increase seems to be attributable to changed attitudes about the use of violence. What Should Happen? Schools work with children and young people during their formative years. A long history of research illustrates the importance of schools in helping children avoid delinquency and that factors such as poor academic achievement can lead to serious problems (Gottfredson, 2001). There is clear evidence that the climate and ethos of a school can be changed. In the past, schools have been seen as institutions separate from other local services and often blamed for their problems. Yet schools are strongly influenced by their surrounding communities and the lives and health of the families whose children they teach. One of the most compelling reasons for thinking about the prevention of violence and school safety is that, in many countries, children and young people experience higher levels of victimization than other groups in the population. Globally, the 1990s witnessed a transformation in responses to school violence and safety. Much more attention is now given to school safety by the public and by schools, spurring growth in intervention and research. Security provisions or police-school liaison projects are now only part of the response. Awareness of the links between safety and violence and other school problems, such as bullying, suicide, truancy and dropout rates, and academic failure, has increased. The focus is now less on reacting to school violence and more on promoting school safety through prevention, careful prediction, planning, and preparation (U.S. Departments of Education and Justice, 1999a). Many countries are using comprehensive, whole-school projects that involve a wider range of professionals from the health, education, and criminal justice systems, as well as from schools and their neighborhood communities. More accurate information is being collected about school violence and safety, which stimulates new and creative solutions. ---------------------------- II. The Problem and the Trends Scope of the Problem It is difficult to compare levels of school-related violence among countries because o Many countries do not collect national information about reported school violence. o Countries use different definitions of school violence. o Differences in language and culture can make it difficult to compare even similar behaviors among countries.[2] o Within most countries, reporting practices can vary a great deal. o Sources range from small, self-report school studies to area surveys of victimization to police or school reports of incidents. o Sources vary across different ages of pupils, types of school, and periods of time. o Schools often are reluctant to admit there are problems. o Peer pressures intimidate students from reporting incidents. Nature of the Violence Defining school violence. In the United States, discussions about school violence and aggression include combinations of bullying, fighting, gang activity, weapons at school, school shootings, violence against authority figures or school staff, violence against peers, racial or bias-motivated violence or intimidation, and vandalism. The violence can occur on school property or on the way to or from school. In other countries, there is little agreement on what constitutes school violence. In other countries, much of what is referred to as violence is in fact bullying, most of it nonphysical, and can include nonviolent events such as graffiti or theft. What many countries have in common is the rise in reported school incidents over the past decade, often linked to increases in police-recorded violence by young people and, in some countries, to concerns about increases in gang activity, weapons, and drug use among young people (Pfeiffer, 1998; Estrada, forthcoming). Reporting practices. A reporting problem has arisen. Because of concerns about violence, schools now report far more incidents to the police. Consequently, increases in school violence may not indicate actual changes in students' behaviors. A Swedish study suggests this (Estrada, forthcoming). Up to the mid-1980s, only serious violent incidents in Swedish schools were reported to the police. The schools dealt with all others internally. From the mid-1980s on, it has become school practice to report all incidents to the police. So while there has been a 300-percent increase in reports of school violence in Sweden since 1993, these are all minor assaults that would not have been reported before. Serious violence has not increased. In some countries, teachers have reported increased violence in schools against students and staff, and the verbal abuse of staff. In the early 1990s, Canadian teachers reported increases in the occurrences of weapons (usually knives), ethnic conflicts, and extortion among elementary school children.[3] Outside the United States, the recognition of bullying as a major school problem has led to many more reports of incidents (Smith et al., 1999). ---------------------------- As recently as 5 or 6 years ago, bullying was a nonissue in Scottish schools. Now it is well and truly on the agenda. --Action Against Bullying in Scottish Schools, Mellor, 1995 ---------------------------- Young victims and victimizers. It is now recognized that children and young people experience higher levels of victimization than any other age group. Most of it comes from their peers, in and out of school, and there are strong peer pressures not to report it. Some children are both victims of abuse, whether at home or school, and victimizers. o A survey of 12- to 18-year-olds in Alberta, Canada, found greater victimization in school than out of it, among younger children than older ones, and among males than females (Gomes et al., 2000). In addition, students who had been suspended or who had thought of dropping out of school reported higher levels of victimization and were the least likely to report incidents, especially if they belonged to racial and ethnic minority groups. o In the United States, children ages 12 to 18 are more likely to be victimized away from school than at school. Nevertheless, children ages 12 to 14 are more likely to be victims of crime at school than older students. National data show that 6 percent of 12- to 14-year-olds were victims of violence compared with 3 percent of 15- to 18-year-olds (U.S. Departments of Education and Justice, 2000b).[4] o In South Africa, a national survey found that 40 percent of rapes and 43 percent of indecent assaults were against girls under age 17 and often at school. ---------------------------- Incidents in French Schools by Type table is not included in this ASCII plain- text file. To view this document in its entirety, download the Adobe Acrobat graphic file available from this Web site or order a print copy from BJA at 800- 688-4252. ---------------------------- Current Picture of School Violence The international information we do have about school violence comes from studies in individual schools, national or school-based victimization surveys, health and education studies, and police reports. o In France, a national survey (1998-99) of violence in middle and secondary schools identified 88,500 incidents among the 3.5 million students. The most common was verbal abuse, followed by theft, attempted robbery, and physical violence. Only 2 to 3 percent of the incidents were serious enough to report to the police, and 93 percent of the incidents were caused by students.[5] Other students were targeted in 67 percent of these cases, the staff in 17 percent, and school property in 15 percent. The survey rated 2.6 percent of the incidents as serious. o In Japan, school violence against pupils, staff, or property was reported in 2 percent of elementary schools, 30 percent of middle schools, and 37 percent of high schools (U.S. Departments of Education and Justice, 1999a). o In South Africa, 62 percent of violence among young people involved racial incidents, and school-based sexual assault of girls has increased. A 1999 study found that more than 30 percent of rape cases among 15- to 19-year-old girls involved a schoolteacher. o In Canada, 20 percent of violent crimes committed by 12- to 17-year-old urban youth, reported to the police in 1998, occurred on school property and seldom resulted in serious injuries. Only 20 percent of the incidents involved a weapon (Canadian Centre for Justice Statistics, 1999). In the Province of Quebec, 9 percent of youth in schools are victims of extortion-although 15 percent are in Montreal (Tondreau, 2000). o In the United States, the levels of school crime and violence have been decreasing since the early 1990s. The majority of all incidents (61 percent) involved theft. In 1997, this meant that only 8 out of 1,000 students were victims of violent crimes at or on their way to or from school. Four teachers in every 1,000 were victims of serious violence in 1994-98 (U.S. Departments of Education and Justice, 1999a). Nevertheless, much of the drop in violence relates to serious violence and current levels are still above those in the early 1980s. One study suggests that there is more weapon-carrying in schools than school administrators are aware of (Hamilton Fish Institute, 2000).[6] International surveys allow us to make some comparisons between levels of insecurity and bullying and other behaviors in schools across countries. The 1999 Annual Report on School Safety, for example, suggests that 12th grade students in the United States were more likely to be threatened by another student in the past month than those in 7 other countries. On the other hand, reports of being bullied and feelings of insecurity among 15-year-olds in 22 countries suggested that American students were around the average. In almost all those countries, while the majority of students did not report being bullied in the current term, fewer students reported they always felt safe at school. Levels of insecurity at school are clearly a concern. These comparisons must be set against the fact that the United States has much greater problems with gun-related crimes among young people than other countries (Hamilton Fish, 2000).[7] ---------------------------- Who Are the Bullies? Gender: More boys report bullying than girls. Age: In Canada, 11- to 12-year-olds report bullying others more than younger and older students. Temperament: Bullies tend to be hyperactive, disruptive, impulsive, and overactive. Aggression: Bullies are generally aggressive toward their peers, teachers, parents, siblings . . . and tend to be assertive and easily provoked. Physical strength: Boys who bully are physically stronger and have a need to dominate others; girls who bully tend to be physically weaker than others in their class. Lack of empathy: Bullies have little empathy for their victims and show little remorse about bullying. --Adapted from Bullying and Victimization: The Problems and Solutions for School-Aged Children, National Crime Prevention Centre, 2000 ---------------------------- Bullying Bullying is one type of aggression, common in schools, that is deeply embedded in peer culture and often underreported. A widely used definition describes it as an aggressive act with an imbalance of power and some element of repetition that can be physical, verbal, or indirect, such as social exclusion. Reported levels of bullying in schools vary across countries, although there are many similar patterns.[8] Older children tend to bully younger ones, and boys are bullied more than girls.[9] Studies in Norway found 9 percent of children had been bullied over the past year; in Britain it ranged from 4 to 10 percent (Sharp and Smith, 1994). In Spain, a study in Seville found 15 percent of secondary school children were bullies and victims (Ortega and Mora-Merchan, 1999). In Japan, studies show that bullying is most common in elementary and middle school and that students in their first year of middle school report the highest level of bullying (Morita et al., 1999). Most bullying involves verbal or indirect, rather than physical, incidents (23 percent).[10] Canadian surveys of children up to 8th grade found 6 percent of children admit bullying others, and 15 percent admit being victimized (National Crime Prevention Centre, 2000). In the United States, 26 percent of 15-year-olds said they had been bullied in the current term (U.S. Departments of Education and Justice, 1999a), and a study of junior high and high school students found 77 percent had been bullied in their school careers (Arnette and Wasleben, 1998). In Australia, a self-report study in the mid-1990s estimated 1 in 6 or 7 children were bullied on a weekly basis (Rigby and Slee, 1999). In Germany, studies found that 4 to 12 percent of students experienced frequent and persistent bullying, depending on their age, area, and type of school (Lšsel and Bliesener, 1999). Not everyone recognizes bullying as an important aspect of the school safety problem. A 1999 American survey by the National Crime Prevention Council found that almost 50 percent of parents did not see bullying as serious.[11] In many countries, including the United States, studies show that children who are bullies or are victimized repeatedly are more likely to develop other problems as they grow older, including dropping out of school and truancy, delinquency and crime, unemployment, and depression. Bullying occurs in all types of schools and can have short- and long-term effects on students--from increasing fear and insecurity to medical conditions such as posttraumatic stress disorder. Students can be so afraid after an intimidation, whether or not it is physical, that they avoid going to school. Bullying has links, therefore, with other forms of school violence, serious events that occur, and health and well-being. It helps to explain some of the most serious acts of violence, including suicides. In some countries, suicides have been the catalyst for work on bullying and school safety.[12] Safety Issues for Girls and Boys School safety issues affect girls and boys differently. Girls are less likely to use aggressive behavior than boys and tend to use exclusionary or verbal tactics. They are more subject to sexual harassment. In South Africa, the incidence of sexual assault among girls is increasing, and 40 percent of rape cases nationally involve girls under age 17. Projects specifically tailored to girls' needs are being developed in Australia, Canada, South Africa, Sweden, and the United Kingdom. ---------------------------- A focus on perpetrators [of violence] is in danger of ignoring the fact that high levels of violence, and the threat of violence, in a school will have a marked effect upon all school students, sometimes . . . undermining their ability to concentrate in class, disrupting their attendance, and causing some of them to feign sickness in order to avoid the hazards of school. --Reducing the Violent Victimization of Young People in a London Neighbourhood, Pitts, 1999 ---------------------------- Social Exclusion, Minorities, Hate Crimes, and Harassment Concentration of poverty and social problems in some European countries has focused discussions on social exclusion. In France, social exclusion refers to those who are excluded from the benefits of participating in mainstream society because of long-term unemployment and poverty. They are usually concentrated in areas of public housing, and schools in these suburbs and inner cities have had problems with violence. A recent survey shows a growing sense of insecurity among pupils and teachers in such schools in France since 1995.[13] This is attributed to increases in group violence and extortion and violence in elementary schools. The incidence of group extortion, swarming, and mobbing has increased in a number of countries, and drug use has become much more prevalent among young people.[14] The pace of migration and immigration is affecting many countries. Germany, where reunification and immigration rapidly changed demographic patterns and standards of living in the 1990s, and South Africa, which has experienced decades of conflict, have both faced problems of racial violence and harassment among young people. Schools and their communities have had to cope with an influx of foreign-born students and with families struggling to adapt to a new culture and language. Some school populations have changed so fast that racism and gang activity have been exacerbated, educational standards have fallen, and the turnover in pupils and staff has accelerated. ---------------------------- -A survey of 663 teenagers in a British city school found boys' levels of fear decreased between the ages of 11 and 16 (30 percent of 16-year-olds expressed fear when outside) while among girls it increased (to 68 percent at 16). --"Fear of Crime," Goodey, 1995 ---------------------------- In many European countries, there has been a shift from seeing schools as safe places with a few delinquents to seeing them as potentially dangerous places. Safety Concerns There are different definitions and understandings of school safety and violence prevention. The overlapping concerns for both students and staff include o Safety from accidents and injuries. o Safety from self-harm. o Safety from intrusion. o Safety from fear of victimization. o Safety from vandalism. o Safety from theft. o Safety from bullying and intimidation. o Safety from sexual and racial harassment and assault. o Safety from violence and aggression. o Safety from group mobbing or extortion and drug and gang activities. Overall View of School Violence Attitudes about youth violence have changed and now provide greater recognition of the extent of young people's victimization by their peers and its variation among girls and boys and different minority groups. School-based incidents are reported more often. In some countries, school violence is concentrated in areas plagued by poverty and social problems, which are exacerbated by population changes and immigration, and by drug use among young people. Schools have been invaded by street crime and violence, which have focused attention on the areas and schools most at risk. Observations about the current situation include the following: o Most countries report problems of aggression, minor assaults, and bullying in all types of schools. o Some countries perceive that school violence has increased in recent years; others attribute that perception to changing attitudes toward violence and greater awareness of its extent. o Frequent and persistent problem behaviors are restricted to a minority of pupils, or are widespread in schools in areas with serious social and economic problems. o A few countries have serious problems of youth violence and racism that have had an impact on schools. o Most aggressive and violent behaviors are inflicted by students against their peers, much less often against teachers, and rarely by teachers against students. o Levels of insecurity in schools in many countries are quite high. ---------------------------- III. International Developments European Initiatives The European Commission, the administrative body of the 15 countries that make up the European Union, launched a Violence in Schools Initiative in 1997 in response to growing concerns about school safety. The 2-year project funded information and data collection about current policies and projects, and intercountry project development and networking as they relate to school safety. It recommended a multidimensional approach involving schools, pupils, and their families to promote prosocial behaviors. The initiative was followed by a Safer Schools conference held in Utrecht, Holland, in 1997, and a 1998 European Conference on Initiatives To Combat School Bullying held in London. In the past 10 years, inspired by successful Norwegian projects (Olweus, 1993), bullying prevention has become a major area of intervention. The European Network on the Nature and Prevention of Bullying is developing a 4-year comparative project with research teams in Germany, Italy, Portugal, Spain, and the United Kingdom.[15] A number of school violence projects have been developed in Germany to respond to crime, racism, and violence in urban and rural schools.[16] Netherlands The national government has launched a series of initiatives to promote school safety. A safety-at-school campaign ran from 1994 to 1999 to encourage schools to develop social competence, deal with incidents, and provide safe premises. Another school safety and security campaign was launched in 1998 by the Ministry for Education, Culture, and Science that provides schools with support to tackle crime problems in partnership with local youth services, the police, and youth justice. A new national campaign will be launched in 2001 by the Ministries of Interior, Education, Care and Welfare, and Justice as part of a wider focus on behavior in public domains. Its focuses will be youth participation in adopting school codes of behavior, and creating initiatives and interactive workshops on substance abuse and weapons. In The Hague, a 3-year curriculum for teachers on the prevention of delinquency and bullying has been developed. Each school will be required to send two staff members to the course. They will be responsible for analysis, development, and evaluation of an action plan in their school and for training other school staff.[17] Additional innovations include o An antibullying project in 22 elementary schools funded by the Mental Health Agency (Junger-Tas, 1999). o Adoption by many schools of a National Education Protocol Against Bullying, developed by Dutch education and parent organizations. o The SPRINT project Duivendrecht that combines teaching and treatment with research to develop competency in elementary school children (Bendit et al., 2000). United Kingdom Work on disruptive and violent school behavior has a long history in England and Wales, much of it concerned with its links to school drop-out and delinquency rates rather than school safety (Graham, 1988). In the 1990s, a number of whole-school antibullying projects have been evaluated (Sharp and Smith, 1994; Pitts and Smith, 1995).[18] Guidelines and teaching packages to aid practitioners, parents, and children have been published in various languages (Sharp and Smith, 1994; Home Office, 1996; Johnson et al., 1992; Mellor, 1995). Following the school deaths in Dunblane, Scotland, in 1996, greater attention is being paid to the physical security of schools in the United Kingdom.[19] This includes publishing guidelines on developing police-school partnerships and using the law to protect pupils and staff. ---------------------------- In England, a whole-school, antibullying approach in 23 schools in Sheffield included setting out precise procedures for preventing and responding to bullying, improved playground supervision, and implementing courses for improving problem-solving skills and assertiveness. The programme was successful in reducing bullying in primary schools, but had relatively small effects in secondary schools . . . . Another initiative in two high crime public housing estates . . . targeted two primary and two secondary schools . . . . Two years later, levels of bullying had decreased in three of the schools. --"What Works in Preventing Criminality," Graham, 1998 ---------------------------- HAEC Teacher Curriculum: Prevention of Delinquency and Bullying o Analysis of school problems, strengths, and weaknesses. o School contribution to the development of desired values. o School teaching climate and characteristics. o School role in truancy, dropouts, bullying. o Classroom teacher skills. o Teaching special skills--self-esteem, behavioral choices. o Integration of program with other community youth agencies. o Developing an action plan and evaluation. --Adapted from The Nature of School Bullying: A Cross-National Perspective, Junger-Tas, 1999 ---------------------------- Joint initiatives from government departments encourage or direct local authorities to work in community partnerships such as the Children and Youth Partnership Programme and Schools Plus: Building Learning Opportunities. They target at-risk schools and children in disadvantaged areas in response to recent reports on youth crime, truancy, and school exclusion (Social Exclusion Unit (SEU), 1998). Local and police authorities are now required to develop crime prevention strategies with community partners such as school and youth offender teams. A number of community-based partnership projects involving schools have been set up in the past 5 years and include the following: o Using Mentors To Change Problem Behavior in Primary School Children--an early intervention project in London that targets 5- to 11-year-old children (Roberts and Singh, 1999). o Meeting Needs and Challenging Crime in Partnership With Schools- -provides home-school support and crisis management to reduce truancy (Vulliamy and Webb, 1999). o Moss Side Youth College, Manchester--provides out-of-school education for the excluded, a community bus, 8-til-late homework clubs, and Internet literacy (SEU, 1998). o Morpeth School, Tower Hamlets--provides afterschool math and literacy supplemental teaching for 11- to 16-year-old children, in collaboration with businesses. o Computer Gym--provides a mobile classroom for low-income public housing estates. o Schools Plus--develops supplementary school activities, such as breakfast clubs, homework centers, Saturday school, mentors, and family literacy projects (SEU, 1998). o Crime Reduction in Secondary Schools (CRISS)--a national pilot project that addresses bullying, truancy, and crime in 103 secondary schools as part of a government target to reduce school exclusions by one-third by 2002. Scandinavia The pioneering work on the prevention of bullying in schools was developed in Norway (Olweus, 1993).[20] Now referred to as the whole-school approach, it combines specific rules about bullying, curriculum projects, reporting of incidents, and better playground supervision. Bullying and other forms of antisocial behavior declined by 60 percent, and students felt more secure. Many schools in Sweden have adopted whole-school antibullying programs and prevention projects, some supported by the national education agency. Annersta School in Huddinge developed a program to improve social relations in school and with the community to curb violence, mobbing, racism, and gang organization. After 2 years, parental and local business links had increased, and vandalism and violence among pupils had decreased (ECPA, 1999). Rinkeby School in suburban Stockholm used a comprehensive range of initiatives that resulted in major reduction in school violence and other problems. The Children's Ombudsman has recommended strengthening the school law against bullying, placing an obligation on school staff to prevent it, making the reporting of incidents the duty of all members of the school community, and improving teacher training. Finland has a new education bill requiring all schools to intervene and take action to prevent bullying. France ---------------------------- To fight violence and insecurity is also to fight inequalities and a sense of injustice . . . . --Claude Bartolone, Minister for Cities, France, March 1999 ---------------------------- France has always taken a preventive approach to school violence. Phase I of a joint national plan to combat violence in schools was announced in 1997.[21] Its focus is educative, preventive, and reactive, and it emphasizes the collective role of the school and the need to find solutions that benefit all pupils, parents, and staff.[22] Among the initiatives are o Establishing observatories to collect local statistics on a range of social, economic, and health indicators to identify schools in problem areas.[23] o Increasing the use of mediation in schools. o Developing clear and appropriate responses to violent incidents. o Setting up intervention projects in the 26 regions (dŽpartements) most at risk of school violence and delinquency. o Developing a number of projects in partnership with schools on citizenship and antiviolence education through victims assistance organizations. o Creating a system of Open Schools (acoles Ouvert) that enables students and adults to use school premises for both study and recreation during evenings, weekends, and holidays. ---------------------------- Solutions to School Violence--1999 French Public Survey o 32 percent: fight school failure. o 32 percent: help parents fulfill their education role. o 27 percent: teach the young citizenship. o 9 percent: reform juvenile justice system. --Ministry of National Education, Research, and Technology, Paris, France ---------------------------- Phase II of the national plan was announced in 2000. It includes the recruitment of 7,000 education assistants and social workers who will receive training in mediation and conflict resolution. The education assistants will help maintain peace on school premises and buses, and will provide individual educational support and teaching. The school social workers and nurses will provide greater support to individual children and their families. Initiatives Beyond Europe South Africa In South Africa, violence among young people, especially in schools, has become a major prevention priority. Young people under age 25 make up 53 percent of the population. High levels of violence, racism, crime, poverty, and lack of jobs and job skills have focused attention on the need to develop a preventive strategy through schools to counter violence in schools. ---------------------------- With 39 percent of South Africans aged between 14 and 35, young people comprise a substantial part of South African society. However, due to the policies of past governments, a large number of young men and women have not had the chance to develop their full potential. They have experienced poor housing conditions, limited and racially-biased access to education and training, limited job opportunities, high levels of crime and violence, and a general disintegration of social networks and communities. --Youth Policy 2000, National Youth Commission, 2000 ---------------------------- A joint national framework for intervention was initiated in 1999.[24] Youth Violence in Schools focuses on tackling the underlying causes of youth violence by targeting those schools with the greatest problems, developing community policing around schools, and developing community action around schools. These objectives are aided by a data engine--improved national and local information--to monitor and evaluate problems and progress. Projects based on the model and other work include the following: o The Crime Reduction in Schools Program (CRISP) in Durban.[25] o The School Watch program in Kwa Zulu-Natal, which has had a marked impact on the prevention of offending and victimization. o The Safer Schools programs being developed by the federal Department of Education and provincial governments. o The comprehensive Safe School Policy in 40 schools, which was developed by the Centre for the Study of Violence and Reconciliation (CSVR).[26] o The guides, training, resources, and programs on school violence prevention being produced by national and provincial governments and nongovernment organizations. --------------------------- Tools that allow children to remain buoyant in the nonviolent stream include o School competency. o Feelings of support and care. o Self-esteem and identity. o Philosophical grounding. o Problem-solving skills. o Confidence with adversity. o Involvement. --Youth Violence in Schools, South Africa, 1999 ---------------------------- Australia A report on school violence in Australia was published in 1994. Much current work is preventive, stressing early intervention and school-community partnerships with a focus on including young people in the design of projects.[27] National Crime Prevention (NCP) is funding a number of school-based developmental projects that target at-risk children and families. Other initiatives include healthy school approaches such as the Health Promoting Schools Association, which is sponsoring the Interagency Schools as Community Centres Pilot Project. This project involves the identification of local needs through community consultation, with funding from local school, education, health, and community services. A growing network of programs, strategies, and resources exists to prevent bullying or teach conflict resolution and peer mediation skills,[28] including helplines and intervention programs such as the PEACE (preparation, education, action, coping, evaluation) Pack (NCP, 1999), Dr. Ken Rigby's Bullying Pages (Rigby, 1995), and Oz Problem Solver: Teaching Students Peer Mediation (Stern, 1996). New Zealand A New Zealand report on school violence looked at the links between bullying and other forms of violence and intimidation in children's lives and at accidents and health problems (Lind and Maxwell, 1996). Although there is no national initiative on school violence prevention, a well-developed antibullying network exists, including a police-business partnership campaign that has sponsored a resource kit program, Kia Kaha, for 8- to 14-year-old children, the Cool Schools Peer Mediation Programme, and an anger management program called Eliminating Violence, all of which have been evaluated (Sullivan, 1999). Canada The public's and teachers' concerns about school violence resulted in a number of studies and guides in the early 1990s and an increase in police-school initiatives.[29] A national survey of school policies identified a need for school boards to focus much more on prevention and community policies (Solicitor General, 1995). Schools were still seeing themselves as separate from their communities.[30] Staff training, better data collection, and evaluation of programs and policies were needed; specific programs for aggressive or violent students were called for that were supportive and corrective rather than punitive, inflexible, or demoralizing.[31] The National Crime Prevention Centre[32] has funded research and guides on school bullying, an inventory of resources on safe and healthy schools (Shannon and McCall, 1999), and a Web-based compendium of evaluated practices emphasizing the links between school safety and health.[33] Its Investment Fund is financing pilot programs targeting at-risk schools. School safety policies and protocols are being developed by a national working group, and the Council of Ministers of Education is developing a school indicators program to provide comprehensive data across the country and promote comprehensive afterschool programming. Other initiatives are o A whole-school bullying program piloted in four Toronto schools (Smith et al., 1999). o Conflict resolution programs in Toronto elementary and secondary schools (Brown et al., 1996; Network, 2000).[34] o A teacher's violence prevention kit for Quebec secondary schools and an inventory of tools and resources (Tondreau, 2000).[35] o British Columbia's Safe Schools Initiative piloted safe school programs in 22 schools in 5 different languages. The project is being evaluated over 5 years and includes the British Columbia Safe Schools Centre. o A nongovernment Safe Schools Network includes the Nova Scotia League of Safe Schools, the Safe and Caring Schools Network set up by the Alberta Teachers Association, and the Canadian Safe Schools Network, which develops projects primarily in Ontario. United States The Federal Government funds an array of work on school safety projects that monitor trends, provide research and evaluation, and support technical assistance.[36] Since 1998, it has published the statistical report Indicators of School Crime and Safety and the Annual Report on School Safety, which provide a comprehensive survey of trends, initiatives, and good practices. An inventory of federal initiatives on school violence has been published by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.[37] Recent major initiatives include Safe and Drug-Free Schools and Safe Schools/Healthy Students. Federal dollars fund the Hamilton Fish Institute on School and Community Violence, a technical assistance center, which is developing and testing the effectiveness of school-based strategies; the National Resource Center for Safe Schools, which works with schools and states to develop comprehensive safe school plans; and the National School Safety Center (NSSC), a resource and training center that provides training for the Community Oriented Policing Services (COPS) in Schools program.[38] Past initiatives have focused on reducing school violence with programs that target the facilitators of violence: drugs, gangs, and guns.[39] Among these programs are the School-Related Crime Prevention and Safety Initiative that funds police partnerships with schools and communities, School and Community Action Grants that fund the application of tested programs to curb violence, and COPS in Schools that funds community police-school partnerships. More recent initiatives stress comprehensive school-committee approaches. The Safe and Drug-Free Schools Initiative provides resources to every state and most school districts. It funds school-community projects and supports training and technical assistance, including satellite telecasts.[40] The Safe Schools/ Healthy Students Initiative funded 54 demonstration programs in 1999 and another 22 since then.[41] In each case, local education authorities are working in partnership with public mental health providers, justice and law enforcement authorities, and families and students. Comprehensive plans based on best practices are being developed to promote students' health and prevent violence. Technical assistance has been provided and a national evaluation is being undertaken. State initiatives include statewide program development in Colorado, New York, and North Carolina. The Center for the Prevention of School Violence is based at the University of North Carolina and the Center for the Study and Prevention of Violence is based in Colorado. In 1998, the U.S. Conference of Mayors published Preventing School Violence: Best Practices of Mayors in Collaboration With the Police, Schools and the Community and the National Crime Prevention Guide to Safer Schools. Trends in Approaches to School Safety The examination of approaches to school safety employed by concerned countries has revealed a number of emerging trends. These include the following: o Framing the issues more on school safety and less on school violence. o Linking school safety with the needs of victims and victimizers and to healthy behaviors. o Changing emphasis from a reactive or punitive focus on perpetrators of school violence to proactive approaches. o Shifting from physical, situational prevention, or school expulsion to comprehensive approaches that use a range of policies and programs. o Using programs geared both to problem students and to the entire school population, teachers, and families. o Developing school-community partnerships. o Targeting at-risk schools using evaluated model programs. o Involving young people in the assessment of problems and project design. ---------------------------- IV. Critical Elements of a Comprehensive Approach to School Safety From School Violence to School Safety Although the extent and types of problems experienced by schools vary in different countries, some common strategies and methods for tackling them have emerged. The approaches emphasize four major issues: o Perceiving the school within its community setting by opening school premises to local residents and pupils after school hours, inviting community members to participate in school activities, and creating links with local businesses and other professional groups. o Focusing on the school atmosphere, not just physical security or individual students. o Using a partnership problem-solving model. o Employing multiple strategies, not single programs. Some of the major programs and intervention strategies currently being used around the world are discussed below. Interventions With Unintended Consequences An Australian report (NCP, 1999) classifies three major types of intervention with young people: coercive, developmental, and accommodating. Many past approaches to school violence have focused on the first type. In some countries, the long-term problems of excluding students from school because of violence or drug use are being recognized. The problems with expulsions and suspensions are that they raise the likelihood that those students will become even more involved in delinquency, drugs, and violence, which can affect the school by increasing street crime in the surrounding neighborhood. The short-term gains for the school do not add up to the long-term costs for the excluded students and their communities. Zero-tolerance policies are another approach, but there is considerable confusion about what they are. They are often taken to mean tough, uniform punishments for any incident, such as automatic and immediate expulsion. Many school boards in Canada, for example, say they have zero-tolerance policies, but in practice they mean that any incident has consequences of some kind, ranging from curfews and extra work to suspensions and exclusion. ---------------------------- Approaches to Youth Crime Prevention Coercive approaches: o Emphasize crime control, deterrence, reducing opportunities, and exclusion. o Young people are seen as problem or threat. Developmental approaches: o Emphasize social problems, youth participation, inclusion of all young people, and opportunity enhancement. o Young people seen as part of the community and the solution. Accommodating approaches: o Emphasize dealing with immediate conflicts using negotiation, mediation, and multiagency cooperation. o Young people seen as legitimate stakeholders and users of public spaces. --Hanging Out: Negotiating Young People's Use of Public Space NCP, Australia, 1999 ---------------------------- In the United States, federal law requires schools to expel pupils carrying firearms. Since passage of the law in 1994, the number of pupils expelled doubled in some states, but has now declined overall (Annual Report on School Safety, 2000; Hamilton Fish Institute, 2000). Countries such as France explicitly avoid using terms such as zero tolerance because they imply a lack of flexibility. They prefer to talk about immediate or alternative responses rather than a single one. This means a clear, rapid, appropriate response proportionate to the seriousness of the incident, and includes aid to victims. ---------------------------- Whether zero-tolerance policies and the corresponding increase in expulsions have made students safer in school, and at what cost to those expelled and to society in general, require a closer look . . . . The heavy use of suspension and expulsion can be seen as an expensive practice for the community even when it is cost effective for the school . . . . If students who are suspended or expelled do not reenter school right away, they are likely to fall farther behind academically and are at increased risk of falling into criminal activity in the community. --Zero Tolerance: The Alternative Is Education, Kingery, 2001 ---------------------------- In America, intervention projects offering alternatives to school suspension and expulsion are being developed by the Department of Education, which is spending $10 million to identify model programs, and the Hamilton Fish Institute. Many school projects in England and Wales are specifically concerned with preventing expulsion or working with the excluded to get them back in school or in the job stream. One English project refers students to a special school support worker after serious verbal or physical incidents instead of using exclusion. Earlier Intervention Developmental studies have shown that the earlier we can intervene in children's lives the better the chances are of reducing the risks of behavioral problems, delinquency, bullying, and school truancy and dropping out (National Institute of Justice (NIJ), 2000; Gottfredson, 2001).[42] Such studies have documented impressive reductions in problem behaviors, improved scholastic achievement, better parent management skills, and higher employment levels for both young people and their parents. Effective intervention strategies show that risk factors can be turned into positive points for intervention and prevention and that o The earlier the intervention, the more effective it is. o Programs that target multiple problems are more effective than those that deal with only one risk factor. o Long-term interventions are better than short-term ones. o Preadolescent interventions are the most effective. Early intervention programs in elementary schools have the residual effect of helping to improve school safety in secondary schools. This has led many countries to target at-risk schools and to use evaluated programs with proven success records. It has also been shown to be much less costly to intervene early.[43] What Works The most successful prevention plans combine programs, address the entire school population, design special projects to target at-risk groups and individuals, and solicit teacher support. (See chapter VI for the range of prevention approaches being used and their targets.) The 1999 Annual Report on School Safety provides good examples of model prevention programs in the United States that use well-designed projects, have proven effectiveness, are adapted to local school and community needs, and are used as part of a comprehensive plan. These plans include codes of conduct and protocols to define school norms and deal with daily events and situations, safety plans to deal with serious events, support for pupils with particular problems, and a curriculum and other projects for teachers to improve conflict resolution and mediation skills. Some countries, such as Canada and the United Kingdom, have developed police-school protocols (Bala et al., 1994). ---------------------------- A common feature of recent prevention concepts is that programs should not be too narrow, but should address school life in general. --"Germany," Lusel and Bliesener, 1999 ---------------------------- Mediation. A lot of school violence is about relationships. Developing negotiating skills, peer group mediation, conflict resolution, and restorative approaches are all tactics being used internationally. Some countries have good, evaluated training programs. In France, school assistants in classrooms and on playgrounds and school buses provide additional mediation and monitoring support. The range of mediators has grown to include peers, adults in and outside the school, and the two parties themselves. In the United States, good practice guidelines suggest that peer mediators should not be restricted to "natural" problem-solvers but should include students from different ethnic groups and those who are shy, have anger management problems, or have learning disabilities (Edwards, 1997). Group conferencing that brings together family members, friends of victims, and perpetrators is used in Canada to resolve serious school incidents (see Network, 2000; Correctional Service Canada (CSC), 1999). Education. A wide range of skills development programs addressing social skills, assertiveness, anger management, conflict resolution, and general education programs on civics, antiviolence, antidrugs, racism, and sexism is being used. In some countries, courses and workshops can be taught by specialists from outside organizations such as the National Victim Support and Mediation Institute (INAVEM) in France and CSVR in South Africa. Targeted individual pupil support. This concept includes individual counseling and group work, mentoring, and programs for expelled and suspended students. The support can be inside the school, such as student assistance centers and school social or health workers, or in the local community. The programs work with victims, aggressors, and those at risk. Teacher training and support. This can include special training workshops and basic teacher training. Specialized school social workers or medical staff in England, Wales, and France help relieve stress on teachers and students affected by class disruption. Whole-school antibullying programs. These are good examples of comprehensive plans. They consist of a general school policy written with the active collaboration of pupils, teachers, and parents that includes implementation and evaluation plans. With the very young, no-blame approaches are often used to encourage children to talk about incidents. Helplines. Helplines, such as KIDSCAPE and CHILDLINE in the United Kingdom, are being used in many countries, especially to report bullying. Antiviolence hotlines encourage children to report incidents and to name places and individuals without fear of reprisal. Teaching aids, such as the Australian antibullying PEACE Pack, provide guidance to schools on how to raise awareness of bullying, develop school policies to deal with it, counsel children in class to gain support, work with parents, and evaluate interventions. Schools that use the pack have experienced a 25-percent reduction in bullying (Rigby and Slee, 1999). Developing Comprehensive Approaches Detailed outlines for developing comprehensive school-community plans are provided in the United States by the Education and Justice Departments, the Hamilton Fish Institute, and the Center for the Study and Prevention of Violence. South Africa's Youth Violence in Schools is another example. Many projects in England and Wales use a similar multiagency, multimethod strategy. The 1998 Annual Report on School Safety sets out seven steps for developing and implementing such plans. School safety partnerships include the school community, parents, social and youth services, police, courts, volunteer organizations, faith communities, local businesses, and residents. Checklists of warning signs and risk factors for school problems and violence, such as the National School Safety Center's Mosaic of 20 Questions or the U.S. Departments of Education and Justice's Early Warning, Timely Response: A Guide to Safe Schools, have been developed for use by school staff. They need to be used carefully as a guide and as part of a broader comprehensive plan. Goals and targets are being used increasingly, such as in the prevention projects in England and Wales. ---------------------------- Seven Steps For Developing and Implementing a Comprehensive School Safety Plan 1. Partnership. 2. Identify and measure. 3. Set goals. 4. Research programs and strategies. 5. Implement. 6. Evaluate. 7. Revise plans. --Annual Report on School Safety, 1998, U.S. Department of Education and Justice, 1998 ---------------------------- Other Support A major feature of prevention programs is helping schools and communities to develop sound safety plans. Experience has shown that a program that reduces violence in one country or city may not work in another. Good programs need good implementation. Schools have little time to spare and developing good plans requires leadership, energy, and experience. Increasingly, technical training and support are available. One approach is clustering, or bringing together groups of schools, to train or develop and evaluate projects. It is an efficient and effective way to promote project development. Variations of the model include o Clustering of schools in project development, assisted by a research, university, or technical center, as is done in the Gauteng Townships of South Africa. o Clustering of teachers from all schools in an area who train together in a series of workshops and seminars, such as The Hague curriculum. o Provincial or statewide initiatives to provide support, training, and technical help, along the lines of the British Columbia Safe Schools Initiative. o Cross-national training and support, such as the European antibullying project that provides training seminars over a 3-year period to project researchers and practitioners and offers short-term placements in different countries. Other approaches include specialized institutes and resource centers and safe school networks that have been established in a number of countries to act as resource and support systems. A number of guides that use comprehensive approaches are now available. American examples include Creating Safe and Drug-Free Schools: An Action Guide (U.S. Departments of Education and Justice, 1996); and Early Warning, Timely Response: A Guide to Safe Schools (Dwyer et al., 1998). Media attention to school safety issues is another concern, given the dangers of increasing fear when the media reports tragic events. Schools should have protocols that detail who should speak to the press after serious incidents (Bala et al., 1994). Good project results also need to be shared with the local community. Many countries post project information on the Internet. In the United States, a range of videos, online workshops, and listservs provides training in comprehensive plan development and media protocol development. Other resources include the National School Safety Guide: America's Safe School Week; Educated Public Relations-School Safety 101 (Greenbaum et al., 1986); and Preventing School Violence (NIJ, 2000). Summary The critical elements of a comprehensive approach to school safety include[44] o Identifying and mobilizing key partners in the school community, including parents, local agencies, community organizations, residents, and the private sector. o Developing a careful assessment of local school and community problems to determine policies and priorities based on partnership consensus. o Developing local action plans to address the causes of school violence and victimization, not just its symptoms, and promote healthy schools. o Implementing and evaluating long- and short-term prevention projects. o Remembering that this is a long-term process and the necessity of educating the public that prevention is a normal part of local school and community life. ---------------------------- Figure 1 is not included in this ASCII plain-text file. To view this document in its entirety, download the Adobe Acrobat graphic file available from this Web site or order a print copy from BJA at 800-688-4252. ---------------------------- V. What To Look Out For In spite of good guidelines and models, experience in many countries shows that developing and implementing good safety plans to prevent or reduce school violence and fear is not always a straightforward process. Some of the pitfalls include the following: o Raising awareness about school safety and the risks of violence can increase fears and insecurity among students, staff, and families. o Better reporting and data collection may result in apparent increases in incidents, so there must be careful monitoring and evaluation of other indicators. o The media can inflame anxieties, leading to exaggerated and rigid responses. o International comparisons can be useful but it must be remembered that there are differences in languages, cultures, local customs, and even explanations.[45] o Projects must be appropriate to the culture of their school communities, as have been shown by the experiences with the Aboriginals and Maori in Australia and New Zealand (Sullivan, 1999). o New problems can arise that require plans to be flexible and sometimes revised. A recent problem in the United Kingdom stemming from the phenomenal growth in mobile phone use among children has resulted in an increase in robbery of mobile phones by young people, much of it around schools. o The challenge of developing partnerships and engaging the local community can be compounded when a school is not located in the community from which it derives most of its students. o Schools that are receptive to developing projects often are not those with the most problems (Lšsel and Bliesener, 1999). o Forming packs and adopting guides is not sufficient for developing effective, sustainable programs; a clear policy commitment is needed at the local school level.[46] o Schools need financial support from national, regional, and local governments for policy development; although the competition for funding can stimulate good plans, it can demoralize schools that lose out. Student insecurity and fear of violence have become central concerns in many countries so reducing fear and lessening the likelihood of violence or injury are major goals. But it also is recognized that risk cannot be eradicated entirely. The best approach is good planning and prevention developed and shared by communities. This approach is more beneficial and less costly than reacting after tragic events. Good leadership from the principal affects the ethos, climate, and organization of a school. It affects pupils, teachers, and school support staff. Internationally, the school in its community is seen as having a crucial role in promoting a safe, healthy environment and preventing delinquency, violence, and victimization. It cannot do so in isolation. ---------------------------- VI. Examples From Practice This chapter describes examples of current school safety projects that use multiple methods and partnerships. The projects are in varying stages of development and all include evaluation, although final project outcomes are not always available. Sources and contact information are given for followup. The examples include individual, comprehensive school-community programs in elementary and secondary schools, clustering projects, provincial and statewide initiatives, and projects built around conflict resolution approaches. They use various research teams and partnerships to assist the schools. Infor-mation about school safety projects in the United States can be found in the Annual Reports on School Safety and other publications of the U.S. Departments of Education and Justice and from the Hamilton Fish Institute and the Center for the Study and Prevention of Violence. Clustering Schools Safe Schools Policy and Tiisa Thuto (Gauteng Townships, South Africa) The problem. A 1997 conference found that adult crimes such as rape, theft, and assault were prevalent even in primary schools and that the average age of youth in the 11th and 12th grade was 18 to 20 with few graduating with job skills. A need to belong, lack of home support, boredom, and lack of prospects made violence, crime, and youth gangs attractive. Victim support was needed, given the high incidence of violence. The projects. The Centre for the Study of Violence and Reconciliation (CSVR) has developed a Safe Schools Project using a community-based model of intervention. Forty elementary and secondary schools are clustered in a supportive network, allowing them to share resources. A project newsletter has been established, students are involved in strategy and project development, and parents are involved in problem solving. The project acts as an umbrella for activities by providing safety teams to research, document, monitor, and evaluate project activities; teacher training and support programs; student training and support programs; student-run community safety projects; parent education; and training for student governing bodies. A government monitoring program maintains links among programs, services, and government departments at the local and national levels. CSVR is also part of Tiisa Thuto, a modular training course for pupils, teachers, parents, and communities in the same schools. Run by a business consortium, it combines the expertise of police, educators, and organizations that specialize in sports, mediation and conflict resolution, peer counseling, trauma and abuse, and victim issues.[47] Each partner provides its specific skills training, resources, and modules. CSVR trains parents, teachers, and school governors in trauma management, provides peer counseling, and helps develop school safety teams. Outcomes. Improved parent-teacher-child relations, better teacher support, and a swifter response to children's needs. Overall, reported abuse has declined. Sources: CSVR, www.wits.ac.za/csvr (Internet). Dorothy Mdhuli (Project Director), Safe Schools, dmdhluli@csvr.org.za (e-mail). Tiisa Thuto, Business Against Crime-Gauteng, Tenji Mayekiso (Project Director). Changing the Whole School and Community Lycee Professionel "Les Canuts" (Vaulx-en-Velin, France) The problem. This vocational secondary school with 428 students in a Lyon suburb had deteriorated over a 15-year period. By 1994, levels of violence in the school had soared. It had acquired a negative reputation in the community and many of its immigrant and minority students were unable to get job-training placement. Sixteen percent of the pupils were of foreign nationality, mostly North African. The majority of pupils faced a combination of educational, social, and economic disadvantages, with 80 percent receiving financial aid. The project. To reduce school violence and mobilize community partners, school rules, rights, and responsibilities were delineated for pupils, adults in the school, and parents. Mediation training was introduced, specific projects targeted incoming pupils to help them settle in the school, and teacher teams developed projects to improve class cohesion. An end-of-year festival, twinning with a large engineering school, partnerships with community organizations to promote youth enterprise, and individual casework were initiated. The school worked with justice, police, and local authorities to develop better links with local citizens. Key components included respect for the individual competencies of all partners, listening to pupils and valuing their views, giving students greater autonomy and responsibility, stressing the importance of maintaining energy and dynamism, and adapting to new needs and problems. Outcomes. By 1999, reform efforts had paid off with reports of violence in the school down 60 percent, verbal abuse 50 percent, physical violence against adults 100 percent, and the cost of repairs 70 percent. There was a reduction in intrusions into the school, a rise in student work placements to a total of 7,540 days, fewer school expulsions, a stabilization and increase in the school population, and an improvement in the school's reputation. Sources: Mme. Marie-France David, Academie de Paris, Collge Maurice Utrillo, 100 Boulevard Ney, Paris, 75018 France; 33-42-58-82-90, 33-42-59-53-00 (fax). LycŽe Professionel "Les Canuts," 2 Ho Chi Minh, Vaulx-en-Velin, 69120 France; 33-437-45-2001, 33-437-45-2019 (fax), mfdavid@club-internet.fr (e-mail). ---------------------------- Figure 2 is not included in this ASCII plain-text file. To view this document in its entirety, download the Adobe Acrobat graphic file available from this Web site or order a print copy from BJA at 800-688-4252. ---------------------------- Durham District School Board (Ontario, Canada) The problem. This school district includes large industrial and manufacturing urban centers and rural areas and has experienced rapid growth. Crime in the area has increased; 62 percent of the population is under age 39. In at-risk schools, there are considerable problems of instability with high turnover rates, behavioral and family difficulties, and low educational achievement. The project. A demonstration project was initiated involving students ages 4 to14 at 4 at-risk schools. The school-based program relies on the commitment of community partners and strong community-school links. It is based on a successful approach developed in another school in the region in the 1990s. South Simcoe Public School had many at-risk pupils, severe problems of bullying, fighting, suspensions, a high student turnover, low educational achievement, and a poor reputation in the community. It became one of the top education performers in the region within 5 years. The principal opened up the school to the community and established what she termed a "village-like" atmosphere and a philosophy of respect, which affected all relationships within the school, including that with teachers. Parents were invited to join her, local police officers, and others to read to the children. She instituted a progress tracking system, to report back to parents on a weekly basis, and each class adopted a local business. Academic achievement improved and bullying, fighting, and suspensions were all reduced. Outcomes. Early evaluation of the pilot schools shows clear reductions in fighting, bullying, and suspensions over a 4-month period. Sources: Investment Fund, National Crime Prevention Centre, Department of Justice, 123 Slater Street, Eighth Floor, Ottawa, Ontario, K1A 0H8 Canada; 877-302-6272, 613-952-3515 (fax); ncpc@web.net (e-mail), www.crime-prevention.org/english/main.html (Internet). Sandra Dean (2000), Hearts and Minds: A Public School Miracle, Toronto. Sydney Burnell School (London Borough of Walford, England) The problem. This secondary school, in an economically depressed area, had undergone rapid decline. There were increasing numbers of poor immigrant families in public sector housing and a high rate of neighborhood and school population turnover. The neighborhood had a history of escalating crime, interracial violence, intimidation between whites and Bengalis, and more recent influxes of immigrants fleeing the turmoil of the Balkans. By 1997, the school population of 1,043 students included 85 nationalities. Forty-four percent of students described themselves as white and British, 17 percent as black, and 17 percent as South Asian. More than half the students qualified for free school meals. A high proportion of students had learning and behavioral difficulties. Levels of truancy and feigned sickness had risen. The school was required to accept some older, white adolescents expelled from other schools, often for racial incidents. When racial incidents occurred, mobile phones were used to call up "reinforcements." The project. The Walford Youth Action Team is a multiagency group composed of senior chief executive officers, youth service workers, youth justice staff, education personnel, police, students, parents, and school governors. It works with a university-based research team to support development, implementation, and evaluation. Together they have undertaken an assessment of the issues and formed a school-based action plan for developing school and local community strategies, which involve safety within and beyond the school; a multiagency, multimethod intervention approach; and changes to school policies and organization. Projects include a Headstart program, which provides intensive mentoring to at-risk children in primary school and through the first 2 years of secondary school, an exclusions prevention project, and the joint creation with local youth services of separate male and female student groups to explore victimization, violence, and gender issues. Outcomes. In their interim evaluations, teachers and school inspectors have reported improved student behavior in classrooms, corridors, and on the playground. There has been a decline in staff turnover, an increase in pupils selecting the school as their first choice for secondary education, and improved scores on national education certificate exams. Headstart and the exclusion prevention program also have been evaluated positively. Source: Professor John Pitts, Department of Applied Social Studies, University of Luton, Park Square, Luton, Bedfordshire, LU1 3JU England; 44-1582-743085, 44-1582-734265 (fax); J.pitts@virgin.net (e-mail). Meeting Needs and Challenging Crime in Partnership With Schools (North Yorkshire, England) The problem. Difficult pupils with persistent truant, offending, and disruptive behavior that had adverse impact on classrooms were raising levels of teacher stress. There was a need for better crisis management, teacher and pupil support, alternatives to school exclusion, and more cohesive local authority strategies. The project. The program, begun in 1996 in seven urban secondary and middle schools and steered by a multiagency advisory group, based five full-time social workers in the schools to provide targeted assistance to at-risk children. The assistance includes home visits, help with special needs, befriending, counseling and support, and individual and group work on anger management, peer relations, self-esteem, advocacy, mediation, staff education, parent support, youth forums, and crisis management. Pupils involved in school violence or disruption are referred to the support workers rather than being expelled, which helps calm pupils in inflammatory situations and prevents further deterioration in behavior. ---------------------------- Parents feel that both they and their children benefit considerably from home- school support workers' willingness to listen and to provide practical help. Support workers are seen as unique in their o Access to information about children's lives at school. o Neutrality in relation to school values. o Unconditional help not tied to statutory obligations. --Meeting Needs and Challenging Crime in Partnership With Schools, Vulliamy and Webb, 1999 ---------------------------- Outcomes. There has been a reduction in school exclusions, improved crisis management, and better parent-school relationships. The key mechanisms include long-term and indepth casework, short-term support for other children, school staff understanding of pupils' home circumstances, crisis management, and reducing stress on school staff. All schools have not been equally successful and developing regional policies has been difficult without involvement of higher levels of authority. School prerequisites for success included explicit project support by head teachers and locating the social workers in the school as staff members with full involvement in senior management meetings, giving them an office, and clearly communicating the support workers' role to all school staff. Sources: Home Office Programme Development Unit (PDU) and Graham Vulliamy and Rosemary Webb, Department of Educational Studies, University of York. See Vulliamy and Webb (1999). Cities in Schools (England and Wales) The problem. The challenge was to provide alternatives for children excluded from school, assist with reintegration, and prevent the development of problem behavior. The project. Cities in Schools' Bridge, Reintegration, and Prevention courses have been established in 75 projects across England and Wales. Bridge courses work with 14- to 19-year-old students in groups of 10, providing a personal tutor or mentor while they attend local study programs. Tutors keep in contact with students' families and the project aims to reintegrate 80 percent of out-of-school students. Reintegration courses target 8- to 14-year-old students who have been permanently excluded from school. Prevention courses use home-school links to work in disadvantaged areas, build partnerships with parents, and provide teacher training in behavior management. They assist development of whole-school antibullying programs. Each project is run as a separate charity organization with a local partnership board composed of educators, police, social service workers, job trainers, and local business leaders. Outcomes. The Bridge courses resulted in marked improvement in school attendance, up 80 to 100 percent. Most eligible students achieved national awards and 75 percent of students had positive job or further education placements. The courses were cost-effective, offering better value for the money than alternatives. Source: Utting (1996). The Wetzlar Model Police-School Project (Giessen, Hesse, Germany) The problem. Violence, including racial incidents, in schools and surrounding areas had become a serious issue in Giessen, as in other areas of Germany. There was drug dealing in schoolyards, blackmailing, and a stolen goods trade, and students, teachers, and parents were all afraid of reporting these incidents. There was also a lack of trust in the local police force. A task force report recommended a balanced community and public health approach to developing safe schools. The project. Wetzlar Model Project was initiated by the police 5 years ago in partnership with school staff, pupils, parents, school boards, doctors, youth welfare, and other local groups in 5 secondary schools and 6 vocational colleges. Most initiatives stress prevention, but include rapid responses to violent incidents. Police now respond immediately to calls from the schools and deal with cases swiftly. Other initiatives include a hotline for reporting incidents, break-time activities for students, police training on protocols for responding to incidents, mediation and conflict resolution training, organized sports nights, youth welfare office support for students with behavior problems, monthly meetings among the police, school officials, and other key leaders. Project nights are held with pupil representatives and foreign students and their parents. A school safety council has been established. Outcomes. Trust in the police has been reestablished, reducing fear in the schools. The number of reported incidents has risen from 178 in 1995 to 395 by October 2000, illustrating an increased trust in the police, and there has been a decrease in the amount of violence in schools. The Wetzlar Model is being developed in other regions of the state, and video and training manuals have been produced. Source: Helmut Lenzer, Polizeihaupkommissar, Polizeipraesidium Giessen, Ferniestrasse 8, 35394 Giessen, Hesse, Germany. Ringeby School (Stockholm, Sweden) The problem. In the 1970s, Ringeby School in suburban Stockholm had an elementary school student enrollment of 400, a poor reputation, extensive graffiti, and damage. Bullying and racism were rife and a small group of pupils exerted a negative influence on the school climate. Pupils felt unsafe and half the board of management had resigned. In the local community, more than 80 percent of its 14,500 residents were of foreign origin, representing more than 100 nationalities, uneducated, with high unemployment and welfare dependence and little knowledge of Swedish. The project. In 1989, a Center of the Community plan to revitalize the school began by coordinating local municipal department resources. Activities, such as the local music school, were moved into the school, and a culture and dance program started, in which two-thirds of the students participate. In collaboration with the social welfare department, a school daycare center with two specialized teachers, recreational staff, and two social workers was set up for children with serious problems. They only study there for subjects where they are troublesome in class. This avoids transferring the student out of the school and reduces disruption in classes. The offices of social services fieldwork staff were transferred to the school, reducing costs and improving contact with young people. Homework support is provided. Municipal youth clubs moved nearer the school and are open every day from 4 p.m. to midnight. Unemployed youth have access to the school gym, and other activities have been provided for them. A major project was to involve pupils and parents in organizing a home-school association, management board, pupil council, and cultural awareness program. Students were given responsibility for keeping the school in good repair. Computer access has been a major priority. An action plan against bullying, violence, and racism was introduced with clear rules, student agreements, followup of incidents, and better supervision and parent contact. Outcomes. Pupil involvement in school activities has increased and there has been a radical reduction in school damage and pupil insecurity. In 1998, 84 percent of parents and pupils said they were satisfied or very satisfied with the school, which has become the natural center of Ringeby. Considerable cost savings have resulted from the coordination of resources in the school, improving opportunities for intervention with students. Source: Nominated project for European Crime Prevention Awards 1998. National Crime Prevention Council, Sweden; jan.andersson@bra.se (e-mail); www.bra.se (Internet). Conflict Resolution Plus Independent Project Trust (Kwa Zulu Natal, South Africa) The problem. Urban schools in the Durban area had high levels of violence. Gang activity, carrying of weapons, and bullying and victimization of students and teachers were endemic in the schools and the local community. The difficulty of ensuring the effective development of a single Schools, Medi-ation, and Reconciliation Training (SMART) program led to the broader Community Alliance for Safe Schools (CASS) team approach. The projects. Independent Project Trust (IPT) developed the SMART program in the early 1990s. It trains pupils, teachers, and school governing bodies to develop democratic dispute and conflict management skills. It stresses discipline practices, cultural diversity, and accountability for actions. Students are trained in peer mediation. The difficulty of using these skills because of violence and gang activity led to the creation of CASS in 1997. This province task team involves the major stakeholders to build a sense of community ownership through partnerships, mobilize communities, protect school children, and create safe schools through effective governing bodies. Using a cluster approach, IPT has produced a manual for head teachers and has facilitated workshops and training sessions in three pilot schools. The three schools are within a 10-kilometer radius and join for workshops on data collection, diagnosing school safety problems, developing a school security plan, and related issues. School safety committees have been set up, resulting in better security, monitoring, counseling, police relations, and communication. Outcomes. By 2000, two of the schools had moved into a better category of security. They were felt to be safer places, and levels of reporting of violence had increased as fear of reprisals diminished. The cluster approach was particularly important. Schools felt they would have been unable to effect change without the facilitation support of IPT. Clustering also had proved valuable for collective problem solving as the three schools had successfully lobbied for a change in school bus routes, something they had failed to do independently. Sources: Safer Schools monograph, Secretariat for Safety and Security, South Africa. Margaret Roper: roperm@csir.co.za (e-mail), www.webpro.co.za/clients/ipt (Internet). East Hartford High School (East Hartford, CT, U.S.A.) The problem. East Hartford is an urban high school of 2,100 students, with 72 percent students of color and 28 percent Caucasian. They represent 70 countries of origin and speak 40 languages. By 1992, there were increases in violence in the school, drug use, ethnic tensions, and gangs, coupled with an overloaded school guidance capacity and limited social services. The project. Preventing Violence in Our Schools: A Blueprint for Conflict Resolution targets truancy, violence, discipline, and poor aca-demic performance (see Edwards et al., 1999). A Student Assistance Center (SAC) was established with strict rules and regulations. It is run by a full-time certified staff member, 30 teachers who volunteer on a rotation basis, 1 full-time and up to 9 part-time interns from the University of Connecticut, a substance abuse counselor, and trained student mediators. Conflict resolution and mediation are offered by peers, adults, and through self-mediation. Peer mediators are a cross-section of students who receive a 3-day training program. A student assistance team of volunteer staff oversee students referred to SAC by anyone. Alcohol and drug counseling is offered 5 days a week, Alcoholics Anonymous holds meetings, and other groups for at-risk students exist. Police outreach runs drug and gang resistance intervention programs. Other initiatives include probation links, career mentoring for at-risk children, workshops on college preparation with a consortium of local high schools, and a cultural enrichment program. SAC funds come from federal, state, and local grants. Outcomes. In 5 years there have been no expulsions, a 60-percent drop in suspensions, a 40-percent reduction in fighting, and a school dropout rate below 4 percent. The project attributes part of its success to flexibility in identifying problems, designing programs that have continuous monitoring and adaptation, and strong links outside the school. Sources: Dr. Steven Edwards, Principal, 869 Forbes Street, East Hartford, CT 06118. 860-622-5203; 860-622-5337 (fax); sedwards@easthartford.org (e-mail). Provincewide Programs Safe Schools/Communities Initiative (British Columbia, Canada) This Safe Schools/Communities Initiative is a partnership between provincial government ministries and schools and their communities. It includes the British Columbia Safe School Centre--a resource center that disseminates support and training, examples of best practice, and strategies such as a Safe School Kit, Safe School Planning Guide, and a resource catalogue. Other aspects of the approach include Youth Taking Action Workshops, peer mediation training manuals and resources for elementary and secondary schools, and a mobile trainer who visits schools. Every school board has Safe School District Contacts. They offer training and facilitate communication and dissemination of material and best practices. Safe School Regional Training sessions bring together schools, youth workers, and other professionals. Focus on Bullying is a prevention program for elementary and secondary schools supported by a cadre of trainers across the province. The project. Begun in 1995 with 5 schools, All Together Now is a pilot project in 22 elementary schools across British Columbia. The project is an early intervention and crime prevention initiative that identifies school and community needs. It implements a range of projects to develop resiliency, problem-solving skills, and awareness among children, and offers training for adults working with at-risk youth. Specific projects include bullying programs, mediation, conflict resolution, youth-lead videos, and multicultural and antiracism training. The project focuses on evaluation and sustainability. A final report on 15 schools is expected in 2001. Outcomes. Early indications suggest a reduction of in-school violence, vandalism, graffiti, and greater multicultural awareness and tolerance, more positive attachments to school, improved mentoring and conflict resolution skills, and greater youth involvement in school and community projects. Sources: Wendy Taylor, Director, Community and Youth Programs, Community Programs Division, Ministry of the Attorney General, British Columbia, Canada, 5021 Kingsway, Suite 401, Barnaby, BC, V5H 4A5 Canada; 604-660-2605, 604-775-2674 (fax). BC Safe School Centre: 604-660-7233; www.safeschools.gov.bc.ca (Internet). National Programs National Fight Against Violence in School (France) The problem. The universal concern with school violence in France was supported by a 1998 survey of four schools in high-risk areas that found growing insecurity among students and staff. Between 1995 and 1998, the proportion of teachers who thought there was a lot of violence in their schools rose from 7 percent to 49 percent and among students from 24 percent to 41 percent. It was felt that violence in the classroom and group violence had reached crisis proportions and that more students were using violence, even in elementary schools. The project. Phase I of the 1998 prevention plan targeted several areas in France with the greatest problems of violence: Amiens, Aix-Marseille, Creteil, Lille, and Versailles. Phase I covered 411 secondary schools and colleges and 1,742 nursery and elementary schools. In 2 years, appointments were made for 400 nurses and medical social workers, 100 school doctors, 100 education and training advisers, and 5,000 educational assistants. Each area used a rigorous process of project development that encompassed diagnosis of the problems, planning and implementing initiatives, evaluation, and refinement. A national partnership among education, state and local police, and the courts and local security contracts have changed the response to youth violence, providing schools with guidance on handling incidents and enabling judges to act more quickly. Contracts were signed in 14 departments with INAVEM to provide services in schools. National SOS and hotlines were set up to report bullying, sexual assault, and extortion. Outcomes. After 1 year there was an overall stabilization of school violence and a 10-percent decline in colleges. The violence has declined in most of the experimental zones, although in some areas there was an increase in aggressive behavior toward teachers. In the department Bouches des Rh™ne, there was a reduction in violence of 27 percent in the experimental schools and 15 percent for the department as a whole. In some regions, such as the Paris suburbs, it has increased. An evaluation of the educational assistants found that they had a positive effect on the school climate, reducing corridor and playground problems. The additional specialized staff were justified, but there needs to be stability among staff. Much depended on the local teams. Schools with the longest experience of working in partnership with local teams had the most success. Source: Report on qualitative and quantitative evaluation, Plan de lutte contre la violence ˆ l'ecole, Ministry of National Education, Research, and Technology, Paris, France; www.education.gouv.fr/discours/2000/violenceb.htm (Internet). Crime Reduction in Secondary Schools (England and Wales) The problem. The Crime Reduction in Secondary Schools (CRISS) initiative recognizes the strong links between poor scholastic achievement, bullying, truancy, school exclusions, and offending and the importance of targeting high-risk areas and schools with result-based programs and strategies. The initiative is part of the national Crime Reduction Programme and government plans to reduce school exclusions. The project. CRISS is a 2-year national pilot project (2000-01) to respond to school exclusions, bullying, truancy, and local crime problems. Local authorities and secondary schools across England and Wales were invited to compete for (lbs)12 million in funds to develop a set of required programs with targets for reduction of problems. Contracts for implementation and evaluation teams were also put out to competitive tenders. About £1.5 million has been allocated for the evaluation. A total of 38 projects involving 103 secondary schools were selected from applications in both single school projects and clusters of schools in an administrative area. Projects have created multidisciplinary teams. Interventions include whole-school bullying programs, electronic monitoring of attendance throughout the day with immediate followup, an in-school behavioral unit to work with troubled students, peer mediation training, curriculum changes, key literacy and numeracy projects, improved afterschool clubs, coordinators to develop parent-school links, and antidrug and offending programs run by local Youth Offender Teams. Each school has three teams assisting in implementation and evaluation: a local project initiation and development team, a local evaluation team, and the national evaluation team. Projects are expected to meet target reductions. Outcomes. Evaluations of implementation process and outcomes will be available at the end of 2001. Each project has set targets to achieve by the end of the pilot period, such as reducing bullying by 40 percent, truancy to 1 percent, and permanent exclusions to 15 percent and maintaining 93-percent attendance levels. Schools vary in their project approaches and links with local authority and community organizations. Problems of data collection, data sharing, and confidentiality have been a learning experience and a challenge for some. The national evaluation team is ensuring comparability of data collection and will look at overall outcome evaluation, including cost reductions and benefits. Sources: Home Office, Police and Reducing Crime Unit, Clive House, London, SWIH 9HD England; 020-7273-4000, 020-7271-8344 (fax), www.homeoffice.gov.uk/rds (Internet). ---------------------------- VII. Notes 1. The U.S. Department of Education and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention have been collecting data on school-associated violent deaths (homicides and suicides) since 1992. Although not finalized, the number of students killed in schools appears to be less than 1 percent, of which about 85 percent were killed by firearms. 2. Many different expressions are used to refer to bullying behaviors, such as ijime in Japan and mobbing in Scandinavia, but they are not always exactly the same and there is no German word for bullying (Smith et al., 1999). 3. The Ontario Teachers Federation reported a 50-percent increase in serious and minor school violence between 1988 and 1990 (Bala et al., 1994); see also Walker (1994). 4. An earlier study by Dr. Paul Kingery, Director of the Hamilton Fish Institute, analyzed the results of the National Crime Victimization Survey for 1993-95. He found that 12-year-old children were at greater risk of victimization at school than away from it: 61 percent of girls and 47 percent of boys who were victims of violence by a stranger were injured on school property. See press release of 2/29/00 at www.hamfish.org. 5. One in 44 incidents in colleges was serious enough to be reported to the police, 1 in 28 in general secondary schools (lycŽes gŽnŽraux), and 1 in 31 in technical high schools (lycŽes professionnels), according to the Ministry of National Education, Research, and Technology, Paris. 6. The Hamilton Fish Institute study found that anonymous student surveys report 100 times more guns in schools than school principals do in their annual reports under the 1994 Gun-Free Schools Act. Some 287,000 high school students reported carrying a gun to school in a 30-day period in 1995, but only 2,317 high school students were expelled for doing so in the entire 1996-97 school year (see Hamilton Fish Institute press release and report of 9/14/00 on www.hamfish.org). 7. These include the World Health Organization Health Behavior of School Children survey carried out in 28 countries every 4 years (the United States took part in the most recent 1997-98 sweep); and the Third International Maths and Science Study (see the U.S. Annual Report on School Safety, 1999). A major difficulty, however, is that we cannot be sure that "feeling insecure" in schools in Ireland or New Zealand means the same as in American schools. (See also Akiba, et al., 2001.) 8. Most studies are based on self-reports by children, some on parent or teacher reports. The ages of children in reported studies vary considerably, as does the time period. 9. Not all studies agree. In one British school, there were higher levels of bullying experienced by girls (25 percent) than boys (7 percent) (Noaks and Noaks, 2000). 10. In Japan, there has been much public and press focus on ijime following a series of suicides by school children. 11. See Arnette and Wasleben (1998) for information on bullying levels and The 1999 National Crime Prevention Survey. See National Crime Prevention Council (1999) for parent views on its seriousness. 12. This has been the case in Canada, England, Norway, and Japan. 13. Ministry of National Education, Research, and Technology, Paris. 14. An international survey of 14- to 20-year-olds in 12 countries (Killias and Ribeaud, 1999) found increases in drug use in many European countries, with links to offending. A Canadian school survey noted increases in hard and soft drug use in the 1990s (Centre for Addiction and Mental Health, 2000). 15. The teams are working in eight countries under the direction of nine universities. Part of the project involves a training and exchange program for team staff on the background and origins of school bullying and methods of intervention and evaluation. 16. Two examples are the Roncallistrasse Elementary School project (Bendit et al., 2000) and the Wetzlar Model Police-School partnership (see chapter VI). 17. This is being developed by The Hague Advisory Educational Centre (Junger-Tas, 1999). 18. Two major projects have evaluated the whole-school, antibullying program--in 23 schools in Sheffield (Sharp and Smith, 1994) and 4 schools in Manchester and London (Pitts and Smith, 1995). Other projects to make schools safer included a police SchoolWatch program and a Safer School Safer Cities project in Wolverhampton (Noaks and Noaks, 2000). 19. For example, Report of the Working Group on School Security and Improving Security in Schools. Department of Education and Employment, 1996. School Security: Dealing With Troublemakers. Home Office and Department of Education and Employment, 1997. 20. It was developed by Dan Olweus in 42 middle and primary schools in Bergen, Norway, in the 1980s. 21. It was launched by the Ministry of Education, together with Justice, the Interior, Defense, Culture, and Youth and Sports. A 1994 report, La violence a l'ecole, by the Ministry of Education Inspectorate had highlighted many of the problems. 22. In France, the concept of solidarite is central to understanding all social problems. It stresses that all citizens are linked together collectively and are dependent on one another. Problems such as school violence, therefore, require a collective and community response. 23. A National Observatory for the Safety of Schools and Institutions of Higher Education was set up in 1995. It undertakes school safety surveys and helps schools assess themselves. A 1996-2001 program in the CrŽteil school district set up an observatory to measure school violence and to counterbalance media reporting. It is developing educational, preventive, and judicial responses. 24. The national framework was developed by the National Youth Commission, the Department of Education, and the Secretariat for Safety and Security. It uses the metaphor of a river with violent and nonviolent streams that encourage or protect children from violence as they grow up. 25. CRISP includes the Independent Project Trust and the University of Natal who are piloting the approach in Cape Town and Durban schools. 26. Initially CSVR provided services to victims in townships such as Soweto, but its work has evolved into a more comprehensive community approach. 27. Sticks and Stones: A Report on Violence in Schools. ACT: Commonwealth of Australia (1994). 28. Resource materials are being developed by the Australian Council for Education Research. 29. Education is a provincial responsibility in Canada, and practices vary considerably across the country. See Bala et al. (1994). Other work has reviewed school-based police programs (Ryan and Mathews, 1995), zero-tolerance policies (Gabor, 1995), weapons in schools (Walker, 1994), and a police-school partnership to develop an antiviolence community school (Ryan, Mathews, and Banner, 1994). The province of Quebec published a comprehensive guide to preventing violence in schools (Roy and Boivin, 1989). The Ontario Ministry of Education, teachers unions, and school boards also have produced a number of guides and tools on school violence prevention. 30. Only 4 percent involved their community in prevention plans. 31. In the 1995 survey, 116 out of 210 school boards in large urban areas in Canada were surveyed. Small towns and rural boards were excluded. 32. The National Crime Prevention Centre promotes community safety through social development and funds initiatives throughout Canada. Its Investment Fund is set up to foster and evaluate demonstration projects based on exemplary practice. On school issues, the Centre has collaborated with a variety of other government departments such as Health Canada and nongovernment organizations such as the Canadian Association of School Principals. 33. A gateway Web site (www.safehealthyschools.org) is being developed for a coalition of federal government and national education and health organizations to provide links to comprehensive community, school, and health initiatives. 34. A number of nonprofit organizations also offer conflict resolution workshops for teachers and students in the province (e.g., Alternative to Violence Project). 35. Trousse de prevention de la violence au secondaire (1996) Montreal: Foundation Philip Pinel; J. Tondreau (2000) Inventaire d'outils sur la violence. Montreal: Centrale des syndicats du Quebec. 36. See CDC (2000) for a complete list. 37. This inventory summarizes more than 100 current projects funded by 15 federal agencies: surveillance/monitoring, evaluation research, other research, research synthesis and application, programs, resource development activities, and resource and technical activity centers. 38. See NSSC Web site: www.nssc1.org. 39. Many successful programs to prevent drug and gun use and gang activity in schools and to protect students from recruitment or exposure have been developed and evaluated over the past 10 years, e.g., Gang Resistance Education and Training Program; Drug-Free Communities Program; and Hands Without Guns. See also Preventing School Violence (NIJ, 2000). For an overview of U.S. research on the role of the school in reducing delinquency, see Schools and Delinquency (Gottfredson, 2001). 40. The Safe and Drug-Free Schools Initiative is funded by the Department of Education in collaboration with the U.S. Departments of Justice and Health and Human Services. 41. This includes the U.S. Departments of Education, Justice, and Health and Human Services. 42. Risk factors include family factors such as poor parenting skills, poverty, abuse, and conflict; individual factors such as early aggressive behavior; school factors such as low achievement, bullying, and truancy; and community factors such as poor housing, high resident turnover, poor facilities, and lack of job opportunities. Projects with preschool, elementary, and adolescent age groups often work to improve parenting skills, provide intensive support, and change thinking and behavior patterns. 43. See International Centre for the Prevention of Crime (ICPC), Crime Prevention Digest II (1999a) for a review of risk reduction projects and cost savings in crime prevention. 44. This diagram is taken from Crime Prevention Digest II (ICPC, 1999a) and is the model that is increasingly used to develop successful crime prevention initiatives in other areas, such as cities, households, and on the streets. 45. Europeans tend to talk about poverty, housing, and unemployment levels to explain school and inner-city problems. In the United States, there has been a greater tendency to emphasize family and individual problems and race (Pitts, 1999). 46. In England and Wales, a followup on the use of antibullying packs found that the majority of schools have some form of bullying policy and had tried out other interventions, the most popular being playground projects (60 percent). Most interventions were rated by schools as "reasonably satisfactory" (Smith and Madsen, 1997). 47. 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Appendices. Canberra, Australia: National Crime Prevention Council. National Youth Commission (2000). Youth Policy 2000. Pretoria, South Africa: Office of the Deputy President. National Institute of Justice (NIJ) (2000). Preventing School Vio-lence: Plenary Papers of the 1999 Conference on Criminal Justice Research and Evaluation. Washington, DC: National Institute of Justice. Network (2000). The Network Program on Youth and Schools. Waterloo, Canada. (E-mail: nicr@nicr.ca; Web site: www.nicr.ca.). Noaks, J. and Noaks, L. (2000). "Risk, Safety and Fear of Crime." Educational Psychology in Practice, 16(1): 69-75. Olweus, D. (1993). Bullying at School: What We Know, What We Can Do. Oxford, England: Blackwell. Ortega, R. and Mora-Merchan, J.A. (1999). "Spain." In The Nature of School Bullying: A Cross-National Perspective, edited by P.K. Smith, Y. Morita, J. Junger-Tas, D. Olweus, R. Catalano, and P. Slee. New York, NY: Routledge. Pfeiffer, C. (1998). "Juvenile Crime in Europe." In Crime and Justice: A Review of Research, edited by M. Tonry. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press, pp. 23, 255-328. Pitts, J. (1999). Reducing the Violent Victimization of Young People in a London Neighbourhood. Leuven, Belgium: Paper presented to Eurogang III, Catholic University, October 1999. Pitts, J., and Smith, P. (1995) Preventing School Bullying. Crime Detection and Prevention Series Paper 63. London, England: Home Office Police Research Group. Rigby, K. (1995). "What Schools Can Do About Bullying." The Professional Reading Guide for Educational Administrators 17(1): 1-5. Rigby, K., and Slee. P.T. (1999). "Australia." In The Nature of School Bullying: A Cross-National Perspective, edited by P.K. Smith, Y. Morita, J. Junger-Tas, D. Olweus, R. Catalano, and P. Slee. New York, NY: Routledge. Roberts, St.J., and Singh, C.S. (1999). Using Mentors To Change Problem Behaviour in Primary School Children (5-11). Research Findings No. 95. London, England: Home Office RDS. 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Smith, P.K., Morita, Y., Junger-Tas, J., Olweus, D., Catalano, R., and Slee, P. (eds.) (1999). The Nature of School Bullying: A Cross-National Perspective. New York, NY: Routledge. Social Exclusion Unit (1998). Bringing Britain Together: Truancy and Social Exclusion. London, England: Social Exclusion Unit. Solicitor General (1995). School-Based Violence Prevention in Canada: Results of a National Survey of Policies and Programs. Report 1995-2. Ottawa, Canada: Ministry of the Solicitor General of Canada. South Africa (1999). Youth Violence in Schools. Pretoria, South Africa: Secretariate for Safety and Security. Stern, F. (1996). Oz Problem Solver: Teaching Students Peer Mediation. (Secondary schools). Australia: Barwon Youth Accommodation Committee. Sullivan, K. (1999). "Aotearoa/New Zealand." In The Nature of School Bullying: A Cross-National Perspective, edited by P.K. Smith, Y. Morita, J. Junger-Tas, D. Olweus, R. Catalano, and P. Slee. New York, NY: Routledge. Tondreau, J. (2000). Inventaire d'autils sur la violence. Montreal, Canada: Centrale des syndicats du Quebec. U.S. Conference of Mayors (1998). Preventing School Violence: Best Practices of Mayors in Collaboration With the Police, Schools and the Community. Washington, DC: U.S. Conference of Mayors. U.S. Departments of Education and Justice (1996). Creating Safe and Drug-Free Schools: An Action Guide. Washington, DC: U.S. Department of Education and U.S. Department of Justice, Office of Justice Programs, Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention. U.S. Departments of Education and Justice (1998). Annual Report on School Safety, 1998. Washington, DC: U.S. Departments of Education and Justice. U.S. Departments of Education and Justice (1999a). Annual Report on School Safety, 1999. Washington, DC: U.S. Departments of Education and Justice. U.S. Departments of Education and Justice (1999b). Indicators of School Crime and Safety. Washington, DC: U.S. Department of Education Office of Educational Research and Improvement, and U.S. Department of Justice, Office of Justice Programs. U.S. Departments of Education and Justice (2000a). Annual Report on School Safety, 2000. Washington, DC: U.S. Departments of Education and Justice. U.S. Departments of Education and Justice (2000b). Indicators of School Crime and Safety, Washington, DC: U.S. Departments of Educational Research and Improvement, and U.S. Department of Justice, Office of Justice Programs. Utting, D. (1996). Reducing Criminality Among Young People: A Sample of Relevant Programmes in the United Kingdom. Home Office Research Study 16. London, England: HMSO. Vulliamy, G., and Webb, R. (1999). Meeting Needs and Challenging Crime in Partnership With Schools. Research Findings No. 96. London, England: Home Office RDS. Walker, S.G. (1994). Weapons Use in Canadian Schools. Report 1994-05. Ottawa, Canada: Ministry of the Solicitor General of Canada. ---------------------------- IX. Resources and Addresses Bureau of Justice Assistance U.S. Department of Justice 810 Seventh Street NW. Fourth Floor Washington, DC 20531 202-616-6500 Fax: 202-305-1367 E-mail: askbja@ojp.usdoj.gov Web site: www.ojp.usdoj.gov/BJA Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention U.S. Department of Justice 810 Seventh Street NW. Washington, DC 20531 202-307-5911 Fax: 202-307-2093 E-mail: askjj@ncjrs.org Web site: www.ojjdp.ncjrs.org U.S. Department of Education Office of Elementary and Secondary Education Safe and Drug-Free Schools Program 400 Maryland Avenue SW. Washington, DC 20202-6123 202-260-3954 Fax: 202-260-7767 E-mail: oese@ed.gov Web site: www.ed.gov/offices Hamilton Fish Institute George Washington University 2121 K Street NW. Suite 200 Washington, DC 20037-1830 202-496-2200 Fax: 202-496-6244 E-mail: hfi@hamfish.org Web site: www.hamfish.org Center for the Study and Prevention of Violence University of Colorado Campus Box 439 Boulder, CO 80309-0439 303-492-8465 E-mail: cspv@colorado.edu Fax: 303-443-3297 Web site: www.colorado.edu/cspv National Association of Secondary School Principals 1904 Association Drive Reston, VA 20191 703-860-0200 Fax: 703-476-5432 Web site: www.principals.org National Association of Elementary School Principals 1615 Duke Street Alexandria, VA 22314-3483 703-684-3345 Fax: 703-549-5568 Web site: www.naesp.org National School Safety Center 4165 Thousand Oaks Boulevard Suite 290 Westlake Village, CA 91362 805-373-9977 Fax: 805-373-9277 Web site: www.nssc1.org National Crime Prevention Council 1000 Connecticut Avenue NW. Thirteenth Floor Washington, DC 20036 202-466-6272 Fax: 202-296-1356 Web site: www.ncpc.org European Commission Violence in School Initiative Web site: europa.eu.int/comm/education/violence/home.html European Network of Research on Bullying (England) Goldsmiths College London, England Web site: www.gold.ac.uk/tmr Scottish Council for Research in Education (Scotland) Web site: www.scre.ac.uk/bully Ministry of National Education, Research, and Technology (France) Paris, France Web sites: www.education.gouv.fr; www.cemtic.vd.ch/portail/violence Crime Prevention Research Resources Centre (South Africa) Web site: www.ncps-rrc.co.za International Centre for the Prevention of Crime (Canada) 507 Place d'Armes Suite 2100 Montreal, Quebec H2Y 2W8 Canada 514-288-6731 Fax: 514-288-8763 E-mail: cipc@crime-prevention-intl.org Web site: www.crime-prevention-intl.org ---------------------------- X. For More Information Margaret Shaw Director, Analysis and Exchange International Centre for the Prevention of Crime 507 Place d'Armes, Suite 2100 Montreal, Quebec H2Y 2W8 Canada 514-288-6731 Fax: 514-288-8763 E-mail: shaw@crime-prevention-intl.org Web site: www.crime-prevention-intl.org For additional information on BJA grants and programs, contact: Bureau of Justice Assistance U.S. Department of Justice 810 Seventh Street NW. Fourth Floor Washington, DC 20531 202-616-6500 Fax: 202-305-1367 E-mail: askbja@ojp.usdoj.gov Web site: www.ojp.usdoj.gov/BJA Bureau of Justice Assistance Clearinghouse P.O. Box 6000 Rockville, MD 20849-6000 1-800-688-4252 Web site: www.ncjrs.org Clearinghouse staff are available Monday through Friday, 8:30 a.m. to 7 p.m. eastern time. Ask to be placed on the BJA mailing list. U.S. Department of Justice Response Center 1-800-421-6770 or 202-307-1480 Response Center Staff are available Monday through Friday, 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. eastern time. ---------------------------- Bureau of Justice Assistance Information General Information Callers may contact the U.S. Department of Justice Response Center for general information or specific needs, such as assistance in submitting grant applications and information on training. To contact the Response Center, call 1-800-421-6770 or write to 1100 Vermont Avenue NW., Washington, DC 20005. Indepth Information For more indepth information about BJA, its programs, and its funding opportunities, requesters can call the BJA Clearinghouse. The BJA Clearinghouse, a component of the National Criminal Justice Reference Service (NCJRS), shares BJA program information with state and local agencies and community groups across the country. 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