‘Policing Schools’ Strategies: A Review of the Evaluation Evidence

Background: Schools experience a wide range of crime and disorder, victimizing students and staff, and undermining attempts to create a safe and orderly environment for student learning. Police have long established programs with schools, but there has been no systematic review of evaluations of these programs, outside of police-led prevention classroom curriculum programs such as D.A.R.E.     Purpose: This paper documents a systematic search to identify experimental and quasi-experimental evaluations that assess the effectiveness of non-educational policing strategies and programs in schools.     Setting: Included studies took place in or around K-12 schools in the United States, Canada, and the United Kingdom.   Intervention: Studies were included if they reported on a specific school-based strategy that heavily involved police and did not exclusively involve the police teaching a curriculum or program such as Drug Abuse Resistance Education (D.A.R.E.).   Research Design:  Systematic review of experimental or quasi-experimental evaluations   Data Collection and Analysis: Only those impact studies that used experimental or quasi-experimental design, had at least one outcome measure of school crime or disorder, and were available through December 2009 were eligible.  Electronic searches and other methods were used to identify published and unpublished evaluation reports.       Findings: The searches identified a total of eleven quasi-experimental studies. Ten of the eleven studies would likely have received a “3” on the Maryland Scientific Methods Rating Scale, a common approach to classifying studies on the basis of internal validity.  If evidence rating criteria from the U.S. Department of Education’s What Works Clearinghouse (WWC) were applied, only one study would likely receive a grade of “Level 2” evidence (acceptable with reservations) and the other ten studies would likely not meet WWC evidence screening criteria.   Keywords: systematic review; police and schools; crime prevention&nbsp

The Characteristics and Experiences of Beginning Teachers in Seven Northeast and Islands Region States and Nationally

How do East Coast teachers differ from teachers nationwide? Based on results from a recent survey of teachers, this report looks at the characteristics of beginning teachers to find out what makes them different or similar.The study's researchers define beginning teachers as those with five or less years of teaching experience at the time of the staffing survey.Here's what you'll find in this report:How beginning teachers are supported through professional developmentTeachers' overall sense of preparedness for teachingCharacteristics of teachers' classrooms and schoolsVariables related to teachers' preparation and workplace supports that are associated with their perceptions of preparedness, effectiveness, and retentionThe Regional Educational Laboratory Northeast and Islands at WestEd prepared this report

The Impact of the Safe and Successful Youth Initiative (SSYI) on City-Level Youth Crime Victimization Rates

Background: The physical, emotional, and financial costs resulting from youth violence are well documented. Purpose: This article summarizes the results of a quasi-experimental evaluation study to test a youth violence intervention program in eleven cities in Massachusetts. Setting: In 2011, Massachusetts initiated the Safe and Successful Youth Initiative (SSYI), which provides a comprehensive public health approach for young men believed to be at “proven risk” for being involved with firearms. Intervention: The SSYI program components include: (1) Specific identification of young men, ages 14-24, at highest risk for being involved in firearms violence; (2) Use of street outreach workers to find these young men, assess their needs, and act as brokers for services; (3) The provision of a continuum of comprehensive services including education, employment, and intensive supervision. Eleven cities with the highest count of violent offenses reported to the police in 2010 were selected for SSYI funding in 2011 and began implementing the program. Research Design:  Short-interrupted time series design with a comparison group. The observed and predicted trends in monthly violent victimization rates for the 11 SSYI cities were compared to the next 23 cities (as they ranked in reported violent crime in 2010). Data Collection and Analysis: Using police incident data, researchers examined SSYI's impact on monthly city level violent crime, aggravated assault and homicide rates for persons ages 14-24. Findings: Results indicated that SSYI had a statistically significant and positive impact on reducing the number of victims of violent crimes, aggravated assaults, and homicides per month that were reported to the police.  A city with SSYI has approximately 60 fewer victims of violence each year, ages 14-24, per 100,000 citizens over the post-intervention period. Keywords: quasi-experiment; interrupted time series; crime prevention; violence; Massachusett

Eliminating School Fees in Low-Income Countries: A Systematic Review

This article discusses a systematic review of studies of interventions in low-income developing countries that evaluated the elimination of school user fees (including tuition, uniforms, textbooks and other contributions). Only five rigorous empirical studies were identified that evaluate a school fees elimination program.  Overall, the 36 empirical and descriptive studies identified show positive enrollment and persistence outcomes for fees elimination, although some indicate accompanying tradeoffs in education quality.  The review highlights the need for more rigorous and longitudinal empirical research regarding the effects of various types of school fees elimination policies in low-income developing nations—particularly on the effectiveness of targeting policies to the most vulnerable groups, effects on education quality, and the extent to which fees abolition policies can be sustainable

Community-Based Violence Prevention Study of the Safe and Successful Youth Initiative: An Intervention To Prevent Urban Gun Violence

The causes and drivers of youth violence are complex—related to many variables including poverty, racism, and lack of education, training, and opportunity. In partnership with Wested's Justice and Prevention Research Center, AIR examined the Safe and Successful Youth Initiative (SSYI), an intervention targeting urban firearms violence in 12 cities in Massachusetts. The study looked at community-level changes in violent crime over an eight-year period (2007-2014) in the intervention communities as compared with non-intervention communities.Surveys and focus groups with community members, local youth, business owners, and SSYI program participants across the state provide a unique view into the complexities of these relationships and the central role that race, and changing population demographics have intersected with the way the justice system interacts with young men of color at the greatest risk for gun violence and living in economically vulnerable communities. This report presents the findings and methodology from the study.Key FindingsThe study's results add to growing evidence of previous SSYI findings that declines in violent crime (using police generated crime data) continue in the target cities. Among incidents committed by offenders 14-24 years old (the SSYI target population), there are significant differences between this age group and older offenders in the rate changes for violent crime, homicide, and aggravated assaults.Findings confirm prior evidence that community members are less likely to call the police and report crime when they do not trust the police to act in their best interests (i.e., police treating witnesses as suspects) and when they fear retaliation from cooperating with police,The study reveals a broader problem with the way communities feel targeted by police, rather than a protective supportive partner helping to create a safe community. This result held across different types of community members—from business leaders, to parents, to youth in SSYI and youth who have never had involvement with the justice system.Importantly, results suggest that participation in SSYI results in 2.1 fewer violent crimes each month per 100,000 residents in the post-intervention period compared to cities who do not experience the program and this result appears to be related to levels of concentrated disadvantage in communities. The report also discusses the challenges of applying traditional social science research methods to the study of urban gun violence and offers insights for improving the way evidence is generated in this field of study

Restorative Justice in U.S. Schools: A Research Review

This report provides a comprehensive review of the literature on restorative justice in U.S. schools. The review captures key issues, describes models of restorative justice, and summarizes results from studies conducted in the field

Restorative Justice in U.S. Schools: Practitioners' Perspectives

This research report, developed by researchers at the WestEd Justice & Prevention Research Center, focuses on how practitioners are integrating restorative justice (RJ) practices into their schools as an alternative to traditional responses to student misbehavior. The report covers how and when RJ is used in schools, and the successes and challenges schools face. The study findings are based on data from both a survey of and interviews with practitioners who are implementing RJ in schools

Restorative Justice in U.S. Schools: Summary Findings from Interviews with Experts

Current methods of responding to student offenses in schools are often not effective, and may even be backfiring. Many experts support the use of restorative justice (RJ), an approach to justice that focuses on repairing harm and restoring relationships, rather than simply punishing the perpetrator