Police‐school resource officers’ and students’ perception of the police and offending

Abstract

Using a sample of 271 students from four schools in the southeast region of Missouri, this paper evaluates the impact of school resource officers (SRO) on young people’s views and attitudes about the police and offending. The results suggest that the use of an SRO in schools does not change students’ view of the police in general or offending. This weak impact is, at least in part, attributable to the negative contact that young people may have with the police and their SRO. This study concludes that, since the SRO has no significant impact on students’ perception of police or offending, then it would behoove school administrators to utilize their financial resources for counseling, student‐faculty crime prevention programs or delinquency awareness programs.