Recent Trends in Serious School Violence

School shootings in 1992, which resulted in 56 deaths, ignited an ongoing trend of serious violent incidents at all levels of the United States education system.

When the media picks up a story of the school shooting, the news penetrates the nation. The past 14 years show evidence that more students, unstable from gang relations, ostracism by peers or interpersonal problems, follow suit in the months following an incident.

Memories of the April 1999 incident at Columbine High School resonate in the minds of citizens across the nation, and the fear aggrandizes the actual threat of serious school violence actually occurring. Out of the 20,541 combined deaths and suicides of children and teens between the ages of 5 and 18, only 0.9 percent of these happened on school grounds or at a school-sponsored event. Additionally, during the 2002-2003 school year, only 23 student fatalities occurred in U.S. schools, statistically affecting less than one student per million.

These recent numbers also reveal a decreasing number of incidents of school violence since the new decade. Since the 2001-2002 school year, 17 or fewer homicides have occurred per year, compared with anywhere from 21 to 56 deaths each year in the ‘90s. Considering that United States schools have about 54.2 million students enrolled, the small number gives a positive outlook on the future. Nonfatal incidents, such as theft, fighting and sexual harassment, have also declined by more than 40 percent.

Five attacks for the 2006-2007 school year have already been recorded, all within two months of each other. However, three of those shootings involved adult outsiders entering the school and committing the crimes – a topic for separate consideration, but one just as important as student violence when addressing safety in a learning environment.

Common Triggers for Violence: Gangs and Bullying

The overwhelming majority of school violence resulting in fatalities falls into one of three categories:

• Interpersonal disputes, such as property or a romantic interest;
• Gang-related fights; or
• Suicide.

Middle schools and high schools become breeding grounds for discontent and dispute as children become more insecure about who they are.

Bullying sounds like an everyday, dismissible aspect of school life, but actually many aggressive behaviors and vendettas boil to the surface with the repetitive damage the actions have on youthful minds. Fourteen percent of students, more commonly Caucasian than not, reported being a victim of bullying in 2003. This number represents a significant number of teens, especially when studies show that students committing violent acts are more than twice as likely to have been bullied by their peers. This victimization correlates with a harvesting aggressiveness, eventually unleashed back on the grounds responsible for its existence – school property.

Gang relations, especially in larger, urban high schools, account for the greatest number of school-related deaths categorized by a specific cause. In 2003, 52 out of 220 incidents occurring between 1994 and 1999 were associated with gangs. Gang membership gives teens a feeling of belonging and prominence.

Neighborhoods bordering on the extremes of affluence or poverty foster gangs for kids who have lost support from family and friends, giving them their own sense of community. Gangs generally engage in violence about disputes over "turf lines" or possessions, and bringing opposing gangs together into one environment can lead to clashes on school grounds that trap fellow students in the middle.

Even non-gang students have reported bringing firearms to school as a means of protecting themselves – and regardless of a teenager's motives for carrying one, the more weapons available, the more likely an act with serious repercussions will occur.

Audio

Marian Borg, a professor of sociology at the University of Florida, discusses how being in a school setting can affect violence once it starts.