U.S. flag

An official website of the United States government, Department of Justice.

Research and Evaluation on School Safety: The Structure, Services, and Products of State School Safety Centers

NCJ Number
308601
Date Published
2023
Length
68 pages
Annotation

This second report in a series on State School Safety Centers presents information on those Centers’ characteristics, practices, structures, and services with the goal of enabling stakeholders and policymakers to better understand and identify their perceived impacts as well as to provide models for replication and expansion of services.

Abstract

This report is the second in a series that highlights findings from an evaluation of State School Safety Centers (SSSCs); it builds on the first report by describing the characteristics, practices, structures, and services of current SSSCs to examine variation in their landscape, structure, and activities. This document’s goal is to enable stakeholders to gain a good understanding of the history, characteristics, structure, services, and perceived impacts of SSSCs across the United States and to identify promising practices and models for representation, replication, expansion, and evaluation. The authors suggest that findings from the project reported here may contribute to improved functioning of SSSCs, more intentional development of SSSCs, and better coordination of state efforts to improve local jurisdiction efforts regarding school safety. This report presents the researchers’ methodology, including research questions and data collection; it provides details on the results about SSSC landscape, operations, services offered, and accomplishments and challenges; and it discusses state legislation that guides SSSCs, utilization of staff models, funding needs, provision of remote services, and state legislation’s role in service provision. The report includes four appendixes, including: Director Interview Protocol; Director Interview Codebook; Activity Data Collection, Qualtrics Survey; and Activity Data Collection, Smartsheet.

Date Published: January 1, 2023