Law enforcement officers in schools: setting priorities

Abstract

Increasingly, law enforcement officers are being assigned to US schools as part of the “School Resource Officer” (SRO) program. The SRO’s role is defined as that of a law enforcement officer, a counselor on law‐related matters, and a classroom teacher of law‐related education. This study is a survey conducted to determine what personal characteristics, skills, and job tasks were deemed to be important for an SRO from the perspectives of principals, law enforcement administrators, and SROs themselves. A 64‐item Likert‐scale questionnaire was administered to 161 principals, 159 SROs, and 57 law enforcement administrators in North Carolina. A series of one‐way ANOVAs indicated revealed many significant differences in the importance ratings given to the various items by these three stakeholder groups, suggesting that job expectations for the SRO need to be clarified, and that the SRO role needs to be more clearly defined.

Citation

Lambert, R.D. and McGinty, D. (2002), "Law enforcement officers in schools: setting priorities", Journal of Educational Administration, Vol. 40 No. 3, pp. 257-273. https://doi.org/10.1108/09578230210427172