Report pages 94–99: 90 claims on pp. 94–98 (fact 57, statement 5, evidence 3, conclusion 2, conjecture 7, definition 16).
Sample (N = 1408) · Schools with an official BTAM team (82 percent of sample)
This chapter includes the 82 percent of schools that have an official BTAM team, regardless of whether this team is housed at the school level, district level, or both.
Note that our survey did not attempt to capture actual effects on such outcomes as school crime or violence rates and only captures principals’ perceptions of these issues.
Overall, our survey results indicate that principals think that BTAM is having a positive effect on feelings of school safety and school climate more generally, and at worst no effect.
Sample (N = 1406) · Teams answering effectiveness at maintaining safety
Nine in ten principals (88 percent) had positive perceptions, including 51 percent who said their team was very effective at maintaining school safety and 37 percent who said BTAM was somewhat effective.
This widespread agreement across contexts reflects strong national confidence in BTAM as a foundational element of school safety infrastructure.
Sample (N = 1406) · Teams answering effectiveness at maintaining safety
Very ineffective | 5
Sample (N = 1406) · Teams answering effectiveness at maintaining safety
Somewhat ineffective | 5
Sample (N = 1406) · Teams answering effectiveness at maintaining safety
Somewhat effective | 37
Sample (N = 1406) · Teams answering effectiveness at maintaining safety
Very effective | 51
Sample (N = 1406) · Teams answering effectiveness at maintaining safety
Don’t know | 2
This figure depicts response data from the following survey question: “How effective do you believe this BTAM team is at maintaining school safety?” (n = 1,406).
Includes only those who said their school has a school- or district-level BTAM team.
The widespread adoption of BTAM at schools across the United States has raised concerns about its impact and perceived impact on a variety of school-specific outcomes, such as safety, crime, fairness of school discipline across all students, and school climate more broadly (see, e.g., Cornell et al., 2025; Cornell, 2020; Nekvasil and Cornell, 2015).
Principals had a very positive overall perception about the effectiveness of their school BTAM program when it came to keeping their schools safe (see Figure 12.1).
Sample (N = 1406) · Teams answering effectiveness at maintaining safety
principals said they believe that BTAM was somewhat ineffective at maintaining school safety, and another 5 percent believe it to be very ineffective.
Why inferred The sentence crosses a page break: this quote is the page 95 part and the sentence begins on page 94. Full sentence (pages 94–95): “Meanwhile, only 5 percent of principals said they believe that BTAM was somewhat ineffective at maintaining school safety, and another 5 percent believe it to be very ineffective.”
Sample (N = 1406) · Teams answering effectiveness at maintaining safety
Two percent of principals were not sure about the impact of BTAM on school safety.
Principals’ positive perceptions about their BTAM programs’ contributions to maintaining a safe school environment held across various school characteristics.
Principals who only had a district-level team or whose school only had a small BTAM team had slightly lower perceptions of those teams’ effectiveness.
Sample (n = undeterminable of 1406) · Teams answering effectiveness at maintaining safety
Said another way, regardless of the crime level in their school, roughly 90 percent of principals felt that their BTAM team was effective at maintaining school safety.
Most principals believe that their school’s BTAM program positively affected both student and staff feelings of safety (see Figure 12.2).
Sample (N = 1377) · Teams answering program impact questions
More specifically, 66 percent of principals reported that their BTAM program increased students’ feelings of safety (including 7 percent who said BTAM significantly increased feelings of safety), and 70 percent believe that BTAM is increasing staff feelings of safety (including 8 percent who said they believe that BTAM is significantly increasing perceptions of safety).
Sample (N = 1377) · Teams answering program impact questions
Student | 3 | 8 | 24 | 58 | 7
Sample (N = 1377) · Teams answering program impact questions
Staff (administrators, teachers, etc.) | 3 | 7 | 20 | 62 | 8
This figure depicts response data from the following survey question: “What impact do you think your BTAM program has had on the following outcomes at your school?” (n = 1,377).
Includes only those who said their school has a school- or district-level BTAM team.
That is, principals in all types of school settings—whether in a large, urban school or a small, rural school—said they believe that their BTAM program effectively helps keep their school safe.
Sample (N = 1406 total; column N not printed) · Teams answering effectiveness at maintaining safety
Nevertheless, eight in ten of those principals said they believe that their BTAM program was effective.
Furthermore, principals’ positive feelings about the effectiveness of the BTAM team also did not depend on the level of crime in the school.
That is, principals in schools that reported having higher levels of violent crime were just as likely as their counterparts in schools that reported that they had no or only a few violent crimes to feel that their BTAM team was effective in maintaining school safety.
We also asked principals whether they believe that their BTAM program affected student and staff perceptions of feeling safe at school.
However, principals tended to view this relationship as intermediate in size—that is, principals felt that their BTAM program increased, but not significantly, feelings of safety.
The fact that principals perceive a positive (though perhaps intermediate) relationship between BTAM and feelings of safety at school could suggest that schools are already relatively safe spaces, in part, because extreme violent incidents remain rare.
Positive relationships could also be attributable to other factors, such as differing perceptions of safety between principals and students, between principals and staff, or between stakeholder groups.
At worst, principals in our survey perceived that BTAM was neutral (i.e., did not have an impact on student or staff feelings of safety); few reported that the BTAM program was having negative impacts on these perceptions.
Interestingly, principals’ perceptions of the positive impact that their BTAM program was having on student and staff feelings of safety at school were unrelated to the crime level in the school.
Sample (N = 1377) · Teams answering program impact questions
In addition to principals’ positive feelings about their BTAM program’s contributions to school safety, most principals (70 percent) said they believe that BTAM has improved school climate overall, including 11 percent of principals who believe that BTAM has significantly improved school climate and 59 percent who believe that BTAM has improved climate (see Figure 12.3).
Sample (N = 1377) · Teams answering program impact questions
Virtually no principals (less than 1 percent) felt that BTAM worsened school climate.
Sample (N = 1377) · Teams answering the school-climate impact question (Figure 12.3)
Five percent of principals were not sure of BTAM’s impact on school climate.
Taken altogether, these responses suggest that, on balance, principals believe that there is a modestly positive relationship between BTAM and improvements in school climate.
Specifically, principals in elementary schools, suburban schools, and low- or middle-poverty schools were less likely to report that BTAM contributed positively to school climate.
Moreover, principals whose schools had only had small BTAM teams were slightly less likely to indicate that BTAM improved school climate; even in these cases, however, most principals still believe that BTAM had a net positive impact on school climate.
Sample (N = 1377) · Teams answering program impact questions
Has had no impact | 24
Sample (N = 1377) · Teams answering program impact questions
Improved | 59
Sample (N = 1377) · Teams answering program impact questions
Significantly improved | 11
Sample (N = 1377) · Teams answering program impact questions
Don’t know | 5
This figure depicts response data from the following survey question: “What impact do you think your school or district’s BTAM program has had on school climate at your school?” (n = 1,377).
Includes only those who said their school has a school- or district-level BTAM team.
Sample (no n: a percentage change, not a share of a sample) · a percentage that is not a share of a sample (e.g. a percentage-point change or a weighted estimate of the population)
Bar does not sum to 100 percent because of rounding.
Some data labels have been removed for readability.
That is, principals in schools who reported higher numbers of violent incidents were just as likely as those in schools with few to no violent incidents to perceive that their BTAM team had an intermediately sized, though positive, impact on feelings of safety.
Sample (N = 1377) · Teams answering program impact questions
At worst, principals felt that their BTAM program had no impact on school climate (24 percent).
We did observe larger variation in principals’ perceptions of BTAM’s impact on school climate across school characteristics.
Sample (N = 1377) · Teams answering program impact questions
As shown in Figure 12.4, 60 percent of principals said they felt that BTAM decreased or significantly decreased violence rates, and 57 percent believe that BTAM decreased or significantly decreased rates of suicidality or self-harm.
The principals who did not perceive that BTAM decreased rates of violence said they believe that the program was having no impact.
Sample (N = 1377) · Teams answering program impact questions
Only 2 percent of principals believe that BTAM increased or significantly increased the level of violence.
Notably, principals tended to respond that BTAM “decreased,” as opposed to “significantly decreased,” levels of violence or suicides at their schools.
Setting aside that our survey question did not define a specific threshold across response options
this finding suggests that principals believe that BTAM is influencing levels of violence at their schools to some extent.
indeed, data show that many schools only experience one or two violent incidents per year, leaving very little room for improvement (Burr et al., 2024).
Again, this could be because schools are already relatively safe places;
Sample (N = 1377) · Teams answering program impact questions
Violence rates – Total | 10 | 49 | 60
Sample (n = undeterminable of 1377) · Teams answering program impact questions
Violence rates – Elementary (reference group) | 11 | 45 | 56
Sample (n = undeterminable of 1377) · Teams answering program impact questions
Violence rates – Middle | 12 | 54 | 66*
Sample (n = undeterminable of 1377) · Teams answering program impact questions
Violence rates – High | 9 | 56 | 65*
Sample (N = 1377) · Teams answering program impact questions
Rates of suicidality or self-harm – Total | 11 | 46 | 57
Sample (n = undeterminable of 1377) · Teams answering program impact questions
Rates of suicidality or self-harm – Elementary (reference group) | 13 | 41 | 54
Sample (n = undeterminable of 1377) · Teams answering program impact questions
Rates of suicidality or self-harm – Middle | 10 | 50 | 60
Sample (n = undeterminable of 1377) · Teams answering program impact questions
Rates of suicidality or self-harm – High | 10 | 55 | 65*
This figure depicts response data from the following survey question: “What impact do you think your BTAM program has had on the following outcomes at your school?” (n = 1,377).
Includes only those who said their school has a school- or district-level BTAM team.
Bars may not sum to totals because of rounding.
An asterisk (*) indicates that the percentage of principals in secondary schools who said decreased or significantly decreased was statistically significantly different from the percentage of principals in elementary schools who said similarly.
Most principals perceived that their school’s BTAM program was having some impact on levels of violence at their school.
As noted above, one concern around the use of BTAM at schools across the country is the potential for its impact on schools’ use of exclusionary discipline practices overall and whether exclusionary discipline is used fairly across the student population (for a review, see Cornell et al., 2025).
A BTAM program is not intended to increase the use of exclusionary discipline or criminal justice responses; instead, the approach encourages supporting interventions matched to individual student needs.
We asked principals to estimate the impact of their BTAM program on the level of exclusionary discipline (suspensions and expulsions) at their school and on rates at which such practices might affect different student groups.
Sample (N = 1377) · Teams answering program impact questions
Few principals (7 percent) said they believe that BTAM programs are leading to increased use of exclusionary discipline practices.
As shown in Figure 12.5, principals were split over whether their BTAM program decreased their use of exclusionary discipline practices or had no impact in this area.
Although this represents a small subset of schools, such responses merit additional examination to identify what might be driving such changes.
Most principals also believe that their BTAM programs did not contribute to disparities in the use of exclusionary discipline practices across different groups of students.
At best, principals perceived that their BTAM programs were helping reduce differences in use of these practices across the student population, potentially increasing the fairness of disciplinary practices overall.
Sample (N = 1377) · Teams answering program impact questions
Suspension and expulsion rates overall | 53 | 40 | 7
Sample (N = 1377) · Teams answering program impact questions
Race | 40 | 58 | [unlabeled]
Sample (N = 1377) · Teams answering program impact questions
Gender | 35 | 63
Sample (N = 1377) · Teams answering program impact questions
Special education status | 43 | 54
This figure depicts response data from the following survey question: “What impact do you think your BTAM program has had on the following outcomes at your school?” (n = 1,377).
Includes only those who said their school has a school- or district-level BTAM team.
Bars may not sum to totals because of rounding.
Some data labels have been removed for readability.
We collapsed “significantly decreased” and “decreased” as well as “significantly increased” and “increased” for readability purposes.
Find the Perfect Training Class For You
