(An item from the ISHN Member information service)  An editorial and accompanying article on the impact of a program to prevent school violence in Uganda is both starling and controversial. It is so because the problem being addressed includes violence perpetrated by teachers. The editorial states" Still, despite its impressive findings (Of the Good School Toolkit) —a significantly lower rate of violence was reported in intervention schools relative to controls after 18 months, with no apparent adverse effects of the intervention—an astute reader will observe that the total efficacy of the intervention is modest. Even after this rigorous school-based intervention, almost a third of primary school children in the intervention group of the trial still reported one or more episodes of physical violence in the past week. This is violence perpetrated by school staff—acts that in other jurisdictions and countries could lead to severe reprimands, dismissal, or even incarceration. 434 children were referred to child protective services over the course of the trial, representing one in nine trial participants.". The study examined 42 randomly selected primary schools (clusters) from 151 schools in Luwero District, Uganda. The researchers report "We randomly assigned 21 schools to receive the Good School Toolkit and 21 to a waitlisted control group in September, 2012. The intervention was implemented from September, 2012, to April, 2014. Owing to the nature of the intervention, it was not possible to mask assignment. The primary outcome, assessed in 2014, was past week physical violence from school staff, measured by students' self-reports using the International Society for the Prevention of Child Abuse and Neglect Child Abuse Screening Tool—Child Institutional." Read more>>

(From the ISHN Member information service)  An systematic review in Issue #1, 2015 of Journal of Quantitative Criminology concludes that Restorative Justice Conferencing is effective in preventing repeat offending. The reviewers note that "an exhaustive search strategy that examined 519 studies that could have been eligible for our rigorous inclusion criteria, we found ten that did. Included studies measured recidivism by 2 years of convictions after random assignment of 1,880 accused or convicted offenders who had consented to meet their consenting victims prior to random assignment, based on “intention-to-treat” analysis. Results Our meta-analysis found that, on average, RJCs cause a modest but highly cost-effective reduction in the frequency of repeat offending by the consenting offenders randomly assigned to participate in such a conference. A cost-effectiveness estimate for the seven United Kingdom experiments found a ratio of 3.7–8.1 times more benefit in cost of crimes prevented than the cost of delivering RJCs. Read more>>

(From the ISHN Member information service)   Using odds ratio calculations from data from the Canadian HBSC survey, a researcher shows (Vol 66, 2014, Preventive Medicine) that both the perception of safety in a neighbourhood, as well as the actual crime rate, will affect the levels of physical activity among adolescents. However, the article suggests that these are independent variables (with actual crime rates having more impact than perceived safety). Consequently, the author suggests that the reach of PA programs can be improved if we address the perceptions of safety alone. "After controlling for crime and relevant confounders, the relative odds of being physically active outside of school was 0.52 (95% CI: 0.44–0.62) in youth whose perceptions of neighborhood safety were in the lowest quintile. After controlling for perceptions of safety and relevant confounders, the relative odds of being physically active outside of school was 0.75 (0.60–0.95) in youth from neighborhoods with crimes against persons scores in the highest quintile. Within this large sample of 11–15 year olds, perceptions and objective measures of neighborhood safety and crime were independently associated with physical activity in free-time outside of school. Read more>>

(An item from ISHN Member information service) A news release from the Scottish Government launches a consultation on air guns in the same week as the terrible shootings in Conneticut re-ignite the debates in the USA about gun control. The cultural difference could not be more profound and startling. The air gun license requirement will complement gun control measures that are already in place in Scotland. The news release points out that "New statistics on firearms offences published earlier this month show the number of firearms offences recorded by Scotland's police forces fell 21 per cent, from 647 in 2010-11 to 514 in 2011-12. This represents the lowest total recorded in Scotland in 34 years and marks a reduction of more than 50 per cent of 2006/07’s total of 1,260." According to www.gunpolicy.org, there are 32,000 gun-related dearths in the US each year, compared to 155 in the UK. Read more. 

(An item from ISHN Member information service) An article in the December 2012 Issue of the Journal of Youth & Adolescence reports that different forms of religiosity will positively affect youth behaviours in regards to substance use, violence and delinquency. The researchers report that " Results revealed a five class solution. Classes were identified as religiously disengaged (10.76 %), religiously infrequent (23.59 %), privately religious (6.55 %), religious regulars (40.85 %), and religiously devoted (18.25 %). Membership in the religiously devoted class was associated with the decreased likelihood of participation in a variety of substance use behaviors as well as decreases in the likelihood of fighting and theft. To a lesser extent, membership in the religious regulars class was also associated with the decreased likelihood of substance use and fighting. However, membership in the religiously infrequent and privately religious classes was only associated with the decreased likelihood of marijuana use. Findings suggest that private religiosity alone does not serve to buffer youth effectively against involvement in problem behavior, but rather that it is the combination of intrinsic and extrinsic adolescent religiosity factors that is associated with participation in fewer problem behaviors." Read more. 

(An item from ISHN Member information service) An article in issue #5, 2012 of the International Journal of Educational Policy and Leadership notes that teachers and administrators had some differences in their perceptions about bullying. Teachers felt more strongly that educators played an important role in bullying prevention; however, administrators felt more comfortable communicating with the parents of bullying victims. Interestingly, teachers were significantly more likely than administrators to perceive a need for increased bullying prevention training. Significant gender differences concerning the inclusion of bullying prevention in school curriculum were also found. Read more. 

(An item from ISHN Member information service) An article in the October 2012 issue of School Psychology International "reports on the educator portion of a study of cyberbullying at two large, technology-rich secondary schools in Canada. The researchers discuss 17 educators’ experiences with cyberbullying, their knowledge of social networking technology, the priority they place on preventing cyberbullying, and the remedies they suggest. Qualitative analyses of taped interview responses to 16 open-ended questions revealed that they were unaware of the extent of cyberbullying among their students and although they saw prevention as a priority, and were able to pose possible solutions, no policies or programs had been implemented, even by the younger teachers, who were more technologically savvy. Nor were the educators interested in learning the results of the student portion of our research, preferring instead that cyberbullying remain under their radar.  Read more. 

(An item from ISHN Member information service) The October 2012 issue of School Psychology International is a special issue on cyberbullying and schools. The articles include an overview of the challenges, perceptions of elementary school students, reports from Canada, Australia and the evidence showing the need for active support from schools. Read more. 

(An item taken from the daily/weekly/monthly ISHN Member information service)  An article from Issue #3, 2012 of the Journal of School Violence describes the lessons learned from recent school shootings in the US. This article describes a crisis response framework based on the authors' first-hand experience following three Colorado school shootings. During each crisis response, one or more of the authors joined school and/or district crisis teams, providing direct assistance and leadership. The authors' experiences helped guide subsequent responses and assisted teams in better meeting the impacted school's needs. Lessons learned are shared with the intent of organizing and improving school-based crisis response to extreme acts of school violence. Read more..