The School Safety Study: School Context

• In Event: Research on Police in Schools: The School Safety Study

Abstract

Web-based surveys are being collected from school administrators in the participating treatment and comparison schools and from all SROs assigned to work in the schools for at least two months during the 2015-16 school year. To date, 105 school administrator and 76 SRO surveys have been completed, for a response rate of 75% and 67%, respectively. This presentation will report on characteristics of the treatment and comparison schools as reported in these surveys as well as data on baseline school characteristics available from public records. Specifically, the presentation will highlight differences between the treatment and comparison schools by comparing them on contextual factors. Some examples include security practices used in conjunction with the SROs, other prevention programs in place, past experience with SROs, the degree of SRO integration into the school community, the discipline philosophies reported by the school administrator and the SRO, and the degree of concordance between these philosophies. School administrator satisfaction with the SRO program will also be reported.
Implications for potential moderator variables to be used in the main outcome analysis of the study will be discussed. Challenges to collecting data from school administrators and SROs will be summarized.

Author

• Erin Bauer, Westat