School Security Officers Outnumbering Counselors In US Public Schools

There has been a rise in the demand of armed security officers among large US public schools in the past 15 years. In a conducted survey, it shows America's biggest school districts have resorted to using armed security services to ensure discipline and order within the campus instead of counseling.

Security personnel has outnumbered counseling staff in 4 out of ten of the largest public school districts in the U.S, the non-profit educational organization The 74 cited. New York City, Miami-Dade County, Chicago and Houston have invested more on security staff than in counselors.

The American School Counselor Association recommends that there should be one counselor for every 250 students. These top ten schools have failed to comply with this standard and it was only Hawaii with 274 students for every counselor that came close to the recommendation.

In the survey, New York City schools had an average of 5.28 security officers for every 1000 students and only 2.9 counselors. In Chicago, there are 4.21 security staff and only 2.18 counselors for every 1000 students. The numbers only suggest that these schools have resorted to tough discipline in preventing campus violence and enforce order within the school grounds.

In response to what the statistics suggest, American Institute of Research vice president David Osher pointed out the vital role of counselors in creating an environment that is "rich in supports for students" to avoid violence.

This rising demand for armed security within the schools could have been a retaliation to the cases of shootings and campus violence in the past years, Chalkbeat New York reported. A study conducted by Families for Excellent Schools reports that 16,000 violent crimes were reported in US schools in 2015.

Interestingly, the study also shows that schools with high concentrations of colored students are highly likely to recruit more security personnel.

Opposing groups have expressed their disapproval to the armed approach and called the act as "punitive measures contribute to the school-to-prison pipeline and disproportionately targets minority students."