School Safety Questionnaire LONGSCAN 1992 Description of Measure Purpose To assess the teacher s perception of the amount of violence and antisocial behavior present in the subject child s school environment. Conceptual Organization The instrument includes 10 items. The first eight items are statements related to the safety of the school environment (e.g., This school is in a safe neighborhood). The other two items ask about the number of times students and teachers were victimized while on school property during the current school year. Item Origin/Selection Process The first eight items were developed to measure perceptions of safety in the school environment as well as the presence of weapons, gangs, drugs, and serious discipline problems. Questions 9 and 10 were developed to assess the frequency of some of the most common crimes that occur in schools. Materials Non-copyrighted LONGSCAN form, included in this manual. Time Required Less than 5 minutes Administration Method Self-administered 424
Scoring Score Types The teacher is asked to rate each statement on a 5-point scale ranging in value from 1 (very much like my school) to 5 (not at all like my school). Items 4 to 8 should be reverse scored after which items 1 to 8 can be summed to produce a composite score of children s exposure to violence or anti-social behavior in the school environment. Total scores on the first eight items range from 8 to 40. Items 9 and 10, which have sub-items that directly assess the number of thefts, muggings, and assaults experienced by students and teachers can be analyzed separately or combined. Score Interpretation Higher scores reflect greater exposure to violence. Data Points Age 6, 8 Respondent Teacher Mnemonic and Version Age 6: SAFA Age 8: SSA (no modifications) Rationale The ecological developmental model used by LONGSCAN emphasizes the importance of viewing the development of a child within the nested contexts of family, community, and society. Therefore, as we examine the impact of acute and chronic exposures to violence, it is important to assess the prevalence of violence in the school as well as in the family and community. 425
Administration and Scoring Notes After obtaining parental consent, all teacher respondent forms were sent by mail to the subject child s teacher with specific instruction for completion and remittance. Incentives for participation and response rate differed by study site. Results Descriptive Statistics and Reliability Table 1 gives the mean total scores and Cronbach s alpha coefficients for the School Safety Questionnaire items 1 to 8, by child s race and study site at the Age 6 and Age 8 interviews. Black students appear to have been exposed to more violence in their school environments than children of any other racial group at Age 6. At Age 8, Black and Hispanic students appear to have been exposed to more violence at their schools. The school environments described at the EA site had the highest ratings for violence and the schools at the SO and NW sites had the lowest. Table 1 about here Table 2 summarizes data collected at Ages 6 and 8 on student and teacher victimization (items 9 and 10) in the schools. The table shows the proportion of LONGSCAN children who attended a school where the teacher reported that there had been at least one student victimized during the current school year by major theft, mugging, or assault, and also the percentage with at least one report of teacher victimization. These data indicate that the children at the EA and MW were sites are exposed to much more school violence than those at the other sites at both interviews. Data are incomplete for the MW site because interviews are still in progress at this site. Table 2 about here Validity Principal components analysis of items 1 to 8, using a varimax orthogonal rotation, suggests two clusters of variables at both Age 6 and Age 8: Unsafe Environment (items 1, 2, 3, 426
4R, 7R) and Delinquent Students (items 5R, 6R, 8R). Two scales were created based on the results of the principal components analysis. To assess the validity of these scales as measures of school safety, we correlated these scales with the caregiver s report of the quality of the home neighborhood, reasoning that while home and school may be in different neighborhoods, similarities between the two would be expected. Pearson correlation coefficients appear in Tables 3 and 4. Although different measures were used at Age 6 and Age 8 to gather the caregiver's report of the quality of the neighborhood, we were able to construct roughly comparable scales tapping neighborhood safety, availability of help or support from neighbors, and general feelings about the neighborhood. The significant negative correlations between the teacher's description of an unsafe environment around the school and the caregiver report of the home neighborhood, particularly neighborhood safety and positive feelings about the neighborhood, support the validity of these measures. Table 3 about here Table 4 about here References and Bibliography Heavenside, et al. (1998). Violence and discipline problems in US Public Schools: 1996-1997. Education Department, National Center for Education Statistics. http://nces.ed.gov/pubs98/violence/98030001.html. 427
Table 1. Mean Total Scores and Cronbach s Alpha Coefficients for the School Safety Questionnaire. Age 6 and Age 8 Interviews Age 6 Interview Age 8 Interview N M (SD) α N M (SD) α Total 728 15.55 (6.14).84 634 15.18 (6.07).86 Race White 218 12.93 (5.22).86 200 13.03 (5.19).86 Black 378 17.46 (6.22).82 335 16.65 (6.25).85 Hispanic 42 14.48 (5.79).82 24 16.88 (6.69).83 Multiracial 78 14.54 (5.50).84 69 13.72 (5.25).84 Other 12 13.50 (4.62).81 6 16.00 (6.84).87 Site EA 169 19.78 (5.50).77 154 19.94 (6.12).83 MW 53 18.21 (6.91).88 26 16.04 (6.76).87 SO 190 13.07 (5.16).82 158 12.34 (4.17).80 SW 133 15.73 (6.40).86 119 14.45 (5.62).84 NW 183 13.29 (4.78).81 177 13.97 (5.31).85 Source. Based on data received at the LONGSCAN Coordinating Center through 8/24/01. Note. Data collection incomplete at the MW site. 428
Table 2. Teacher Report of Student and Teacher Victimizations at School by Race and Site. Age 6 and Age 8 Interviews Age 6 Interview % with 1 or more students victimized % with 1 or more teachers victimized Age 8 Interview % with 1 or more students victimized % with 1 or more teachers victimized N N Total 744 17.7 28.5 657 18.3 29.1 Race White 218 10.1 16.6 202 11.9 22.7 Black 395 23.0 35.8 350 23.5 35.1 Hispanic 42 9.5 35.9 26 23.1 30.8 Multiracial 77 15.6 19.7 72 11.3 16.7 Other 12 25.0 25.0 7 0.0 33.3 Site EA 178 34.8 58.7 160 30.6 47.5 MW 53 43.4 41.5 29 34.5 44.8 SO 195 8.2 12.2 163 8.6 13.6 SW 136 10.3 27.1 124 19.7 30.1 NW 182 9.3 12.8 181 12.7 23.2 Source. Based on data received at the LONGSCAN Coordinating Center through 8/24/01. 429
Table 3. Correlation Matrix Comparing Teacher s Report of Safety in the School and Caregiver s Report of Neighborhood. Age 6 Interview Caregiver report of neighborhood "Good" Teacher Report Safety Support neighborhood Unsafe environment -.24*** -. 16*** -.20*** Delinquent students -.08* -.02 -.04 Source. Based on data received at the LONGSCAN Coordinating Center through 8/24/01. Note. * p <.05. ** p <.01, *** p <.001 430
Table 4. Correlation Matrix Comparing Teacher s Report of Safety in the School and Caregiver s Report of Neighborhood. Age 8 Interview Caregiver report of neighborhood "Good" Teacher Report Safety Support neighborhood Unsafe environment -.27*** -.07 -.21*** Delinquent students -.11* -.06 -.08 Source. Based on data received at the LONGSCAN Coordinating Center through 8/24/01. Note. * p <.05. ** p <.01, *** p <.001 431