Magnitude of violence
In a 2001 Surveillance of fatal and nonfatal injuries in the United Stated, 92% of non-fatal injuries were unintentional, and 7.3% were violence-related, including assaults, legal intervention and self-harm.5 According to the Bureau of Justice Statistics each year, from 1993 to 1999, an average 1.7 million people experienced violent crime while working or on duty in the United States.6 In the Annual Survey of Occupational Injuries and Illnesses data, it was indicated that 22,400 workplace assaults occurred in 1992 and, of those, the non-fatal workplace assaults accounted for 44% in men and 56% in women.7
Between 1999 and 2000, 135,000 teachers were physically attacked by a student and over 300,000 elementary and secondary school teachers were threatened with injury in the United States.8 From 1999 to 2003, annually, an estimated 183,000 teachers were victims of non-fatal crimes at school. Translated into an annual rate, there were 39 crimes per 1,000 teachers. 8
From a study of nonfatal assault injuries to public school teachers in Los Angeles, it was indicated that violence would have a direct impact on the quality of education from teachers and the retention rates of teachers. 9 Also, in an analysis of 600 random sample claims (1993-1996) in 51 US jurisdictions, schools had the highest percentage of non-fatal workplace violence claims.10