School Resource Officers and Students’ Feelings of Safety at School

• Date: 01 April 2016
• DOI: 10.1177/1541204014564472
• Published date: 01 April 2016
• Subject Matter: Articles

Article

School Resource Officers

and Students’ Feelings of

Safety at School

Matthew T. Theriot

1

and John G. Orme

1

Abstract

The number of school resource officers (SROs) placed at schools has increased dramatically. These

officers are tasked with making schools safer, yet the effect of interacting with SROs on students’

feelings of safety needs more investigation. To address this need, 1,956 middle and high school

students were surveyed. Latent class analysis identified two groups of students, one who felt safe and

another who did not. Regression showed that interacting with SROs was unrelated to these feelings

of safety; instead, African American students and victimized students felt less safe while males,

students with more school connectedness, and students with more positive attitudes about SROs

felt safer.

Keywords

school resource officers, student perceptions, school safety, school violence

Introduction

The purpose of this study was to investigate the effect of interacting with school resource officers

(SROs) on students’ feelings of safety at school. The number of SROs assigned to American schools

has increased during the past two decades. Since the first SRO program was started in Flint, Michi-

gan, in the 1950s, school–police partnerships have existed in the United States; however, a series of

federal incentives beginning in the 1990s dramatically accelerated the number of SROs deployed at

American schools (Brown, 2006; Kupchik & Bracy, 2010; Nolan, 2011). Beginning with the Safe

Schools Act of 1994, federal funds were allocated to improve security and combat criminal behavior

at schools with high crime rates. Although these funds were frequently used to hire law enforcement

personnel in addition to other security measures, federal funding began to focus specifically on

expanding SRO programs in the late 1990s following several high-profile incidents of lethal school

violence. This included a 1998 amendment to the 1968 Omnibus Crime Control and Safe Streets Act

as well as grants distributed to schools from the Office of Community Oriented Police Services

1

College of Social Work, The University of Tennessee, Knoxville, TN, USA

Corresponding Author:

Matthew T. Theriot, College of Social Work, The University of Tennessee, 310 Henson Hall, Knoxville, TN 37996, USA.

Email: mtheriot@utk.edu

Youth Violence and JuvenileJustice

2016, Vol. 14(2) 130-146

ªThe Author(s) 2014

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DOI: 10.1177/1541204014564472

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(COPS Office; Girouard, 2001; Kupchik & Bracy, 2010; Nolan, 2011; Raymond, 2010). Most

recently, SROs were a centerpiece of President Barack Obama’s plan for improving school safety

in the aftermath of the tragic shootings at Sandy Hook Elementary School in December 2012. The

president’s plan to protect children and reduce gun violence specifically called for creating federal

incentives for schools to hire SROs and adding up to 1,000 more SROs and counselors to schools

across the United States (White House, 2013). In 2013, 144 agencies received funding through the

COPS Office in the U.S. Department of Justice to hire a total of 370 new SROs (Community

Oriented Policing Services, n.d.).

SROs are expected to be visible and central figures at their schools. They are charged with diverse

tasks such as patrolling school buildings and grounds, investigating delinquency complaints, assist-

ing with student discipline, educating students and staff about safety and violence prevention, and

mentoring students (Bracy, 2010; Finn, Shively, McDevitt, Lassiter, & Rich, 2005; Kupchik &

Bracy, 2010; Lawrence, 2007; Rich & Finn, 2001). These officers usually are armed and in uniform.

Although they are encouraged to have extensive training in school-based policing topics like crisis

and classroom management and adolescent development, there are no consistent training require-

ments so the level and quality of training received by SROs varies across schools and districts (Kim

& Geronimo, 2010).

Given their comprehensive duties and the expectation that they be prominent figures at schools, it

is reasonable to expect that SROs will impact students’ feelings of safety. However, the relationship

between interacting with an SRO and this sense of safety has not been adequately researched

(Brown, 2006; Juvonen, 2001; Watkins & Maume, 2011). There are important reasons to suspect

that the presence of uniformed police officers at schools might dramatically affect students’ feelings

of safety. Although a visible police presence is expected to deter violent behavior and reassure stu-

dents, community-based research has found that a high-profile police presence actually makes some

people feel less safe (Bridenball & Jesilow, 2005; Dukes & Hughes, 2004; Hinkle & Weisburd,

2008). In these studies, respondents viewed heightened police patrols in their communities as indi-

cative of more crime and disorder and thus felt more vulnerable to victimization. Juvonen (2001,

p. 3) expressed concerns that uniformed school police officers could ‘‘breed a sense of mistrust

among students’’ and hence negatively affect the campus climate. This apprehension and anxiety

could stem in part from the potential conflict between the officers’ law enforcement role and their

roles as a mentor and confidante to students (Kupchik & Bracy, 2010). If students confide about ille-

gal activity, for example, SROs are obligated to take action that could result in disciplinary conse-

quences for students. For example, Bracy (2010) quoted a student who remarked that the SRO is nice

initially but, if you upset him, he will follow you in the halls and search for opportunities to take you

to the office. Conversely, McDevitt and Panniello (2005) found that the majority of students at sev-

eral middle and high schools in their study felt comfortable reporting a crime to their SRO, although

this feeling was not strongly influenced by actually interacting with an SRO. This is consistent with

Bracy’s findings that students often view SROs as friendly in the halls and comfortable for bantering

but are reluctant to approach the officers for counseling or mentoring.

Building trusting relationships with students often requires a gentler and softer approach that is

different from the more assertive and conflict-oriented training received by police officers (Kupchik

& Bracy, 2010). Some SROs recognize this potential conflict and attempt to avoid being a counselor

to students while others are more interested in this role (Bracy, 2010). This sometimes results in

awkward, inappropriate, or uncomfortable interactions between SROs and students. Bracy (2010,

p. 110) described an interaction wherein an SRO said ‘‘I love you’’ to a female high school student

in an attempt to be fatherly and, in another example, an SRO described one of his colleagues as a

‘‘little weird’’ and expressed concern about the way he mentors female students at the school (Kup-

chik & Bracy, 2010). Hyman and Perone (1998) and Mayer and Leone (1999) reported that more

aggressive police tactics actually led to increased school disorder and misbehavior. This includes

Theriot and Orme 131