Perceptions of school violence: School personnel views of violent behavior and preparedness

The increase of school violence in schools is a vital concern. This correlational study sought to determine perceptions of school violence among high school personnel across gender, years of experience, job classification, age, race/ethnicity and level of violence present (operationalized as suspension rate). Previous research has never included all school personnel. Data was gathered on 40 participants using the School Survey on Crime and Safety, which was retrieved from the public domain of the National Center for Education Statistics website (NCES, 2010). For this study the survey was renamed Survey of School Violence & Preparedness. The results suggest that schools with medium suspensions used less disciplinary action than schools with low suspensions, while schools with low suspensions used the most disciplinary action. There were no differences in student incidents across demographic variables. Schools with medium suspensions had stationed the least officers on campus. In terms of demographics, teachers saw more security use than non-teachers. There was a notable racial finding, where White personnel, particularly White non-teachers, perceived the most security use, number of officers, security preparedness, and security participation in the sample