Michigan ranks first in the nation for per capita violent incidents at schools, according to a new report.
The report, from the Educator’s School Safety Network, compiled the number of school threats and violent incidents at schools across the country.
Michigan ranked number one in per capita threats and incidents, with 196 threats in the 2017-18 school year and 13 incidents.
Amanda Klinger is with the network. She says the study compiled news reports of incidents and threats and controlled for population.
“Because if we just say ‘who had the most threats?’ it’s California, they’re a huge state," says Klinger. "So, we tried to control for population, and in some of these smaller population states, just a few violent incidents can be very impactful.”
Klinger says this is the second year that Michigan has been on the top ten list of states of concern.
She says there was an increase of school threats and incidents across the country.
“The year we just finished was a 62 percent increase in threats compared to the previous school year and 113 percent increase in incidents compared to the previous year,” she says.
Klinger says part of the increase may be that incidents are being more widely reported and are taken more seriously. And, she says, social media allows threats to get more attention.
But Klinger says their data likely underestimated the number of threats and incidents across the country.
The Michigan Department of Education did not respond to our request for comment.
You can find the full report here.