The school system in Rutherford County is arguing that a 72 percent increase in reports of crime and violence within the district this year is no cause for alarm. Actually, they make some good points about interpreting government statistics carefully: if you are tracking a small number of events (guns at school, etc.) and have a particularly ?good? year, the next year can post what appears to be a shocking increase in incidents without the reality of risk and safety changing much.
There is also the possibility of an increasing likelihood to report acts of crime or violence, which can generate upward trends that don?t really suggest things are getting worse.
On the other hand, there are still way too many kids who don?t feel safe at school ? and much of that feeling is generated not by full-fledged incidents of crime or violence but by the overall rowdy and disruptive behavior of their fellow students. Discipline and decorum remain serious problems in our public schools, and they interfere to a large degree with successful instruction.
