Skip to main content
Add as a preferred source on Google

NCES Data Report Increases in K–12 School Shootings, Cyberbullying

  • By Matt Jones
  • 07/05/22

The National Center for Education Statistics (NCES) recently released a report titled “Report on Indicators of School Crime and Safety: 2021” indicating a significant rise in both school shootings and cyberbullying activity during the last decade. The results report a total of 93 school shootings with casualties at both public and private K–12 schools during the 2020–21 academic year, the highest number in a single year since data collection began, according to a news release. It also reported that cyberbullying rates have doubled in the last ten years, with 8 percent reported in 2009–10 versus 16 percent reported in 2020–21.

“Although the rate of nonfatal violent victimization at school for 12- to 18-year-olds was lower in 2019 than in 2009, there were more school shootings with casualties in 2021 than in any other year since data collection began in the early 2000s, increasing from 11 in 2009 to 93 in 2021,” said Peggy G. Carr, NCES Commissioner. “While the lasting impact of these crime and safety issues cannot be measured in statistics alone, these data are valuable to the efforts of our policymakers, school officials, and community members to identify and implement preventive and responsive measures.”

The results report 43 school shootings with death and another 50 with injuries only during the 2020–21 academic year. “According to the report, school shootings are defined as incidents in which a gun is brandished or fired on school property,” according to the news release. “During the coronavirus pandemic, ‘school shootings’ also included those that happened on school property during remote instruction.”

The results did indicate a decline in other discipline issues in public schools between the 2009–10 and 2019–20 school years. Student bullying is reported to have dropped from 23 percent to 15 percent; student sexual harassment of other students from 3 percent to 2 percent; and student harassment of other students based on gender identity or sexual orientation from 3 percent to 2 percent.

In higher education, the results report that on-campus crimes decreased in that same timeframe from 23 per 10,000 full-time students to 18.7. However, the rate of forcible sexual offenses increased from 1.7 per 10,000 students in 2009–10 to 8 per 10,000 in 2019–20.

The report was developed as a joint effort between NCES, which is part of the U.S. Department of Education’s Institute of Education Sciences, and the U.S. Department of Justice’s Bureau of Justice Statistics. It covers topics like school shootings, bullying, criminal victimization, disciplinary problems and actions, weapons and fights, availability and student use of drugs and alcohol, security staff presence, student perceptions of personal safety at school and criminal incidents at higher-education institutions. The full report is available on the NCES website.

About the Author

Matt Jones is senior editor of Spaces4Learning. He can be reached at [email protected].

Featured

  • University of Tennessee at Chattanooga Launches New Emergency Communications System

    The University of Tennessee at Chattanooga (UTC) recently deployed a new emergency notification and incident management system for its campus, according to a news release. The university partnered with 911Cellular to launch Safe@UTC, a smartphone app allowing university officials to communicate and respond during emergency situations.

  • Utah Valley University Opens New Engineering Building

    Utah Valley University in Orem, Utah, recently held a grand-opening ceremony for the new Scott M. Smith Engineering Building, according to a news release. The facility is one of the largest engineering buildings in the state at almost 200,000 square feet, and it plays home to the university’s Smith College of Engineering and Technology (SCET).

  • 144-Year-Old High-School Campus Debuts New Academic Facility

    San Diego High School (SDHS) in San Diego, Calif., recently held a ribbon-cutting ceremony for a new student services and classroom building; the project is part of a larger SDHS Whole Site Modernization project that began in 2022.

  • Miami University Approves New $242M Multipurpose Arena

    Miami University in Oxford, Ohio, recently announced that its Board of Trustees has approved construction of a new multipurpose arena at Cook Field, according to university news. The $242-million project will serve as a new centralized hub for student life and create space for economic development on campus.