DiNapoli: Bullying and Drug-Related Incidents in Schools on the Rise

A report by State Comptroller Thomas P. DiNapoli found bullying and drug-related incidents statewide are on the rise, even exceeding pre-pandemic highs, while the rates for the number of serious violent and disruptive incidents remained near zero even after students returned to in-school instruction, and have stayed low. The report examined seven years of data from the New York State Education Department's (SED) School Safety and Educational Climate (SSEC) report.

"Reliable public data about school safety is critical and informs where we need to address problems and identify solutions," DiNapoli said. "This report builds on my office's previous work examining violent and disruptive incidents in our schools. It's disturbing to see the rise in bullying and drug-related incidents. We need to do everything we can to make sure students and teachers feel safe and this data shows there is more to do inside and outside our schools to meet these goals."

In 2019, DiNapoli published a report analyzing the first year of data from SED's SSEC report, which was implemented in school year (SY) 2017-18 to combine Violent and Disruptive Incident Report (VADIR) data with Dignity for All Students Act (DASA) data into one report.

Bullying and Cyberbullying

Bullying is the most frequently reported SSEC incident category. In SY 2023-24, excluding cyberbullying, bullying made up 61.8% of all incidents reported. A total of 29,718 bullying incidents were reported, resulting in a rate of 12.4 incidents per 1,000 pupils. Excluding the 1,734 schools that reported no incidents of bullying, the rate increases to 18.2 incidents per 1,000 pupils, up from 10.2 incidents in SY 2017-18.

Reported bullying rates in New York City were on the rise before dropping sharply during the pandemic. After returning to full in-person learning, reported bullying incidents in the city rose rapidly from 10.5 incidents per 1,000 pupils in SY 2019-20 to 25.8 in SY 2023-24, coinciding with revisions in the Regulations of the Chancellor in 2021, which added examples of bullying and harassment and provided additional guidance on cyberbullying, among other things. Rates of reported bullying in upstate schools remained consistently higher than those reported downstate (excluding NYC), though both regions experienced a gradual decline between SY 2017-18 and SY 2020-21. Both saw similar increases after the return to in-person learning.

When looking at bullying and cyberbullying in SY 2023-24, 34.9% of all public schools (including charter schools) reported zero bullying or cyberbullying incidents. Nearly one in five public secondary schools (17.8%) and nearly half of all public elementary schools (47.7%) reported zero bullying or cyberbullying incidents (including charter schools).

In the SSEC data, cyberbullying incident rates are very low. Many cyberbullying incidents may go unreported because they are difficult to detect and anonymous. In SY 2023-24, 4,396 incidents of cyberbullying were reported statewide, amounting to an overall rate of 1.8 incidents per 1,000 pupils. Excluding the 3,104 schools that reported zero cyberbullying incidents, the rate increases to 4.4 cyberbullying incidents per 1,000 pupils in schools where it was reported. Among schools that reported cyberbullying incidents, those located upstate had the highest rates of cyberbullying prior to the pandemic, while New York City had the lowest. In SY 2020-21, however, reported cyberbullying rates in New York City rose above rates in other regions and remained higher through SY 2023-24 (5.1 incidents per 1,000 students in the city, compared to 3.9 upstate and 3.4 downstate).

Drugs and Alcohol

Drug and alcohol incident rates in secondary schools dropped during SY 2019-20 and SY 2020-21 likely due to the shift to remote learning during this period. When students returned to in-person learning in SY 2021-22, reported drug-related incidents rose above pre-pandemic levels. Incidents for secondary school students rose from 4.2 in SY 2017-18 to 6.5 per 1,000 students in SY 2023-24.

Drug-related incidents have more variation by region, with higher rates upstate than in New York City or downstate districts. In SY 2023-24, incidents were more than twice as high upstate (9.8 per 1,000 students) as they were in New York City (4.2 per 1,000 students). In downstate districts, excluding New York City, the rate was 6.2 per 1,000 students. From SY 2017-18 to SY 2023-24, alcohol incident rates in secondary schools hovered at or below one per 1,000 students in all regions.

Serious Violent and Disruptive Incident Rates Plummet After Definitions Change

Prior to the pandemic, some of the most serious violent and disruptive incident categories (assault, sexual offense, and weapons possession) experienced gradually declining rates from SY 2017-18 to SY 2019-20, although rates for New York City schools were notably higher than for schools outside the city. After the return to in-person learning in SY 2021-22, the incident rates remained much lower than in the years before the pandemic. This coincides with definition changes SED implemented for SY 2021-22. The new definitions for these serious incidents stipulate that the offender must be 10 years of age or older, the incident must meet the criteria for a felony as determined by school officials, and the incident must have been referred to law enforcement.

Cases of assault declined from 4.9 incidents per 1,000 students in SY 2017-18 to 0.5 incidents in 2023-24. Similarly, sexual offense cases fell from 1.6 incidents to 0.1 per 1,000 students, and weapons possession cases dropped from 3.1 to 0.9 incidents per 1,000 students. Because the revised SSEC definitions include age as a criteria for reportability, DiNapoli's analysis of these categories includes only secondary schools (middle, junior, junior/senior high and senior high schools).

Many Schools Report Zero Violent and Disruptive Incidents

Analysis of SY 2023-24 SSEC data shows that 41% of public elementary schools and 5.9% of public secondary schools (including charter schools) reported no incidents of any type. DiNapoli's report said stakeholders should keep in mind that a school reporting zero incidents through the SSEC report may still have records of individual disruptive and violent incidents that are stored locally. For example, incidents that resulted in disciplinary action would be retained, even if the incident did not meet the threshold for SSEC reporting.

Report
Violent and Disruptive Incidents and Bullying in New York Schools: A Review of School Safety and Educational Climate Data

Data
School-level SSEC data