Philip Colin Bolger, Jonathan Kremser and Haley Walker
The growing concern about school violence and security has led to a dramatic increase in the number of police officers working in schools. This increase has been accompanied by a…
Abstract
Purpose
The growing concern about school violence and security has led to a dramatic increase in the number of police officers working in schools. This increase has been accompanied by a focus on the training of school-based law enforcement, the discretion that they exercise when interacting with youth, and the concern that these factors may lead to more youths facing arrest and formal processing by the juvenile and criminal justice system. What is not well understood is whether or not having formal school resource officer (SRO) training or higher education impacts the officer’s decision making when responding to an incident involving a student. The paper aims to discuss these issues.
Design/methodology/approach
This paper uses survey data from school police officers within the USA (n=179) to examine the officer’s preferred post-incident method of disciplining the youth, from the most punitive and formal approach of suspension or referral to juvenile authorities, to the less punitive and informal approach such as diversion or warn and release.
Findings
Overall, the study found that officers who have received formal SRO training were more likely to prefer a formal resolution to the incidents, and more highly educated officers tended to favor less punitive and informal responses.
Originality/value
These findings question the current state of the effectiveness of SRO training at using diversionary tactics for conflict resolution in a school setting.
Details
Keywords
The popular reflow day was repeated at Henley and commenced with Mike Judd giving an overview of current reflow techniques.
Looks at the 2000 Employment Research Unit Annual Conference held at the University of Cardiff in Wales on 6/7 September 2000. Spotlights the 76 or so presentations within and…
Abstract
Looks at the 2000 Employment Research Unit Annual Conference held at the University of Cardiff in Wales on 6/7 September 2000. Spotlights the 76 or so presentations within and shows that these are in many, differing, areas across management research from: retail finance; precarious jobs and decisions; methodological lessons from feminism; call centre experience and disability discrimination. These and all points east and west are covered and laid out in a simple, abstract style, including, where applicable, references, endnotes and bibliography in an easy‐to‐follow manner. Summarizes each paper and also gives conclusions where needed, in a comfortable modern format.