Student Perpetrated Victimization and Support for School Leadership: Comparing School Staff Roles

• In Event: Violence Against Educators in Context: New National Evidence from School Personnel Across Roles and Identities

Abstract

Trusting principal-teacher relationships that cultivate professionalism are crucial to creating positive school climate and increasing teacher retention (Boyd et al., 2011; Price, 2012). These relationships are also critical to violence prevention and professional development (Espelage et al., 2013; McMahon et al., 2024). Teachers who perceive stronger administrative support report less exposure to student aggression (McMahon et al., 2024), while many are dissatisfied with how schools respond to their victimization (Moon et al., 2021).
Other school staff—such as paraprofessionals, counselors, psychologists, and social workers—have received less research attention, despite holding critical, nuanced perspectives on how to support students and build healthy schools (Capp et al., 2022). This paper addresses three questions:
How does student-perpetrated victimization affect school staff’s perceived support from administration? Do perceptions vary by role?
Which contextual and demographic factors shape those perceptions?
Do anxiety and school climate perceptions mediate the link between victimization and admin support?
The sample includes teachers (n = 5,050), paraprofessionals (n = 818), school psychologists (n = 419), social workers (n = 259), and counselors (n = 342) working in U.S. pre-K–12 schools. The main outcome variable was support for administration, which was the mean of three validated items: (a) I can talk openly with my head of school or principal, b) My head of school or principal treats me with respect, and c) My head of school or principal supports me in matters of discipline.
Descriptive findings show that victimized teachers and paraprofessionals report significantly lower support from administration, while other roles show no difference by victimization status. Usingregression models , victimization remained a significant predictor of administrative support for teachers (β = –0.27, p = 0.025) and was marginal for paraprofessionals (β = –0.27, p = 0.091) controlling for experience, race, gender, urbanicity, Title I status, and community safety.
Mediation analysis revealed that, for all roles except school counselors, anxiety and school climate perceptions fully mediated the relationship between victimization and administrative support. Among school counselors, the total indirect effect via anxiety and climate was significant (β = –0.140, p = 0.009), suggesting that even when counselors report increased anxiety and poorer school climate, they still maintain some support for administration.
Preliminary findings suggest that discipline views and anxiety levels mediate perceptions of administrative support. This aligns with prior research indicating that stronger climate and lower anxiety may buffer negative effects of victimization. Teachers and paraprofessionals appear more directly affected by student victimization than other school staff, because of having comparatively more opportunity for victimization and closer proximity to students.

Authors

• Sawyer Hogenkamp, University of California - Los Angeles

• Andrew Holmes Perry, The Ohio State University

• Linda Reddy, Rutgers University

• Chaoyue Wu, University of California - Los Angeles

• Susan D. McMahon, DePaul University

• Eric M. Anderman, The Ohio State University

• Frank C. Worrell, University of California - Berkeley

• Andrew Martinez, Center for Court Innovation

• Ron Avi Astor, University of California - Los Angeles

• Dorothy L. Espelage, University of North Carolina - Chapel Hill