School security problems and the ways of tackling them

Abstract

As open systems, the schools have been deeply affected by the economical, political, and social conditions of our time, and have been expose to many undesirable events and behaviors such as substance addiction, violence, child abuse, sabotage, and the like. To tackle the security problems at schools, it is an asset to diagnose the problems at the first hand and then to search the system wide solutions. Based on the views of the teachers, and managers, this research was done to determine the security problems experienced at schools; and to develop recommendations for tackling them. Three secondary schools, characterized with the most severe security problems, were taken into the research coverage; and 22 people were interviewed by asking open ended questions. The data were analyzed by qualitative techniques. The obtained results revealed that there were various problem sources threatening school security; the school policies and decisions were insufficient; and the school support services were not sufficient and effective as well. Concomitant with the results. Some recommendations such as working collaboratively with the public and private institutions; developing emergency plans; training of the academic staff and the personnel were made. (c) 2010 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.