The fact that principals perceive a positive (though perhaps intermediate) relationship between BTAM and feelings of safety at school could suggest that schools are already relatively safe spaces, in part, because extreme violent incidents remain rare.
cite page 96 Ch 12: What Do Principals Think Are the Effects of Their BTAM Programs?
Positive relationships could also be attributable to other factors, such as differing perceptions of safety between principals and students, between principals and staff, or between stakeholder groups.
cite page 96 Ch 12: What Do Principals Think Are the Effects of Their BTAM Programs?
At worst, principals in our survey perceived that BTAM was neutral (i.e., did not have an impact on student or staff feelings of safety); few reported that the BTAM program was having negative impacts on these perceptions.
cite page 96 Ch 12: What Do Principals Think Are the Effects of Their BTAM Programs?
Interestingly, principals’ perceptions of the positive impact that their BTAM program was having on student and staff feelings of safety at school were unrelated to the crime level in the school.
cite page 96 Ch 12: What Do Principals Think Are the Effects of Their BTAM Programs?
Sample (N = 1377) · Teams answering program impact questions
In addition to principals’ positive feelings about their BTAM program’s contributions to school safety, most principals (70 percent) said they believe that BTAM has improved school climate overall, including 11 percent of principals who believe that BTAM has significantly improved school climate and 59 percent who believe that BTAM has improved climate (see Figure 12.3).
cite page 96 Ch 12: What Do Principals Think Are the Effects of Their BTAM Programs?
Sample (N = 1377) · Teams answering program impact questions
Virtually no principals (less than 1 percent) felt that BTAM worsened school climate.
cite page 96 Ch 12: What Do Principals Think Are the Effects of Their BTAM Programs?
Sample (N = 1377) · Teams answering the school-climate impact question (Figure 12.3)
Five percent of principals were not sure of BTAM’s impact on school climate.
cite page 96 Ch 12: What Do Principals Think Are the Effects of Their BTAM Programs?
Taken altogether, these responses suggest that, on balance, principals believe that there is a modestly positive relationship between BTAM and improvements in school climate.
cite page 96 Ch 12: What Do Principals Think Are the Effects of Their BTAM Programs?
Specifically, principals in elementary schools, suburban schools, and low- or middle-poverty schools were less likely to report that BTAM contributed positively to school climate.
cite page 96 Ch 12: What Do Principals Think Are the Effects of Their BTAM Programs?
Moreover, principals whose schools had only had small BTAM teams were slightly less likely to indicate that BTAM improved school climate; even in these cases, however, most principals still believe that BTAM had a net positive impact on school climate.
cite page 96 Ch 12: What Do Principals Think Are the Effects of Their BTAM Programs?
Sample (N = 1377) · Teams answering program impact questions
Has had no impact | 24
cite page 96 Ch 12: What Do Principals Think Are the Effects of Their BTAM Programs?
Sample (N = 1377) · Teams answering program impact questions
Improved | 59
cite page 96 Ch 12: What Do Principals Think Are the Effects of Their BTAM Programs?
Sample (N = 1377) · Teams answering program impact questions
Significantly improved | 11
cite page 96 Ch 12: What Do Principals Think Are the Effects of Their BTAM Programs?
Sample (N = 1377) · Teams answering program impact questions
Don’t know | 5
cite page 96 Ch 12: What Do Principals Think Are the Effects of Their BTAM Programs?
This figure depicts response data from the following survey question: “What impact do you think your school or district’s BTAM program has had on school climate at your school?” (n = 1,377).
cite page 96 Ch 12: What Do Principals Think Are the Effects of Their BTAM Programs?
Includes only those who said their school has a school- or district-level BTAM team.
cite page 96 Ch 12: What Do Principals Think Are the Effects of Their BTAM Programs?
Sample (no n: a percentage change, not a share of a sample) · a percentage that is not a share of a sample (e.g. a percentage-point change or a weighted estimate of the population)
Bar does not sum to 100 percent because of rounding.
cite page 96 Ch 12: What Do Principals Think Are the Effects of Their BTAM Programs?
Some data labels have been removed for readability.
cite page 96 Ch 12: What Do Principals Think Are the Effects of Their BTAM Programs?
That is, principals in schools who reported higher numbers of violent incidents were just as likely as those in schools with few to no violent incidents to perceive that their BTAM team had an intermediately sized, though positive, impact on feelings of safety.
cite page 96 Ch 12: What Do Principals Think Are the Effects of Their BTAM Programs?
Sample (N = 1377) · Teams answering program impact questions
At worst, principals felt that their BTAM program had no impact on school climate (24 percent).
cite page 96 Ch 12: What Do Principals Think Are the Effects of Their BTAM Programs?
We did observe larger variation in principals’ perceptions of BTAM’s impact on school climate across school characteristics.
cite page 96 Ch 12: What Do Principals Think Are the Effects of Their BTAM Programs?
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