Though it seems obvious that school officials should collect, track and analyze data relating to school safety and security, it is still relatively common to see non-public schools and school districts that do not make it a practice to do so adequately.
For example, while conducting a forensic evaluation as an expert witness in a school homicide case last year, one of the ten largest school systems in the nation was unable to produce data such as the number of weapons confiscated from students, fights and other similar types of data. This of course put the district in a bad position from the standpoint of liability exposure. More importantly, the incident may have occurred because the district was not properly evaluating security incidents to help align available resources more efficiently.
Taking the time to quantify school safety is important and worthwhile.