Guest Editor's Introduction

Abstract

School violence is an important issue in contemporary society. School violence is a conglomeration of several different behaviors that include physical fighting, feeling unsafe, carrying a weapon, and being threatened or injured with a weapon on school property. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (2010) reported that 11% of students were involved in physical fighting, 5% of students felt unsafe at school or on their way to school, 5.6% of students carried a weapon (i.e., knife, gun, or club), and 7.7% of students were threatened or injured with a weapon on school property in 2009 in Grades 9–12. Robers, Zhang, Truman, and Snyder (2010) reported that 38 student, staff, and nonstudent school-associated violent deaths took place in 2009 and 24 were homicides. While this is startling, the rates of victimization at school and being threatened with a knife are declining (Robers et al., 2010). These activities have spurred a substantial amount of research in this area. The research and public outcry has led to some policy implications. One form of policy is school resource officers (SROs). SROs are police officers who are usually employed by a local law enforcement agency and assigned to work in a school or in multiple schools. These officers typically perform traditional law enforcement functions, which include patrolling school property, investigating criminal complaints and violations of laws, and maintaining order at after-school activities. Beyond these functions, SROs educate faculty, staff, and students and improve the school environment. Typically, SROs are uniformed, armed, and have received specialized training for law enforcement in schools. In the past, research has been published in separate venues. Thus, the literature on SROs is in its infancy and is small. Therefore, this special issue on the tactics of SROs has two main purposes. First, it is designed to enlighten the field about SROs by providing articles that empirically examine their characteristics, duties, tactics, and working conditions. Second, it provides