Differences in understanding of school safety by teachers and student : implications for school management

Issue of safety becomes more and more important for school management in times of rapidly changing social context of schools as organizations focused on students individual development. There are numerous factors contributing to safety within school context. When we plan to deal with them in order to build more secure school culture, we have to take into account the fact, that different groups within school community understand safety and look at factors contributing to safety differently. Such statement is obvious but usually neglected when designing school prevention programmes. They are usually build on teachers perception of safety in school and factors contributing to it. It results in artificial or just not adequate measures and actions that do not really touch the problem as it is from the perspective of members of school community such as students. The paper raises the issue of different understandings of safety among school community members. The research was carried out during initial stage of a project “Safe Cracow” run by City Council of Cracow from 2018 to 2020. Schools invited to that project took part in the study. The pilot group of five schools was involved in the study. Groups of teachers and students from the same schools were asked three main research questions: How do you understand safety in school? What factors contribute to school safety in your opinion? What is the main danger for school safety in your opinion? Answers of two research groups are compared to show difference between teacher’s and student’s perspective. On such basis author formulates some recommendations for school management and leadership. Main suggestion paints out the necessity to take into account points of view of different groups working together in school context when designing, planning and organising different actions in school as organization