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Abstract
School violence is a major concern for schools in urban, rural, and suburban areas throughout the country. This paper views the occurrence of school violence as a complicated phenomenon involving the breakdown of the school community. The role of one school reform model, the School Development Program, in affecting violence through the overall school climate is examined. Group psychotherapy is used as a framework to understand how schools implementing the SDP change organizational and management structures to reduce problematic and potentially violent behaviors within a school community.
INTRODUCTION
The issue of school violence has been at the forefront of national attention during the past decade and on the minds of those working in schools each day. The public view of school violence focuses on the tragic events involving the loss of life within a school community. Those working in schools know that violence can be seen in non-fatal events as well, such as fighting, threats of attack, verbal assaults, and fear of unsafe conditions. As in most cases involving complex phenomena, there is no single remedy to this problem, and most schools currently have some type of formal school violence prevention or reduction program in place (National Center for Educational Statistics, 1998). This paper will look at one school reform model, the School Development Program (SDP) through the lens of group psychotherapy, and how this approach addresses issues of school violence.
VIOLENCE DEFINED
Effective interventions begin with a clear definition of the problem. Violence has been defined differently and thus there are multiple ways of understanding the scope of the problem and its possible solutions. Elliott, Hamburg, and Williams (1998:13) define violence as "the threat or use of physical force with the intention of causing physical injury, damage, or intimidation of another person." Their statement is meant to clarify the difference between actual violent behavior and the many other risk factors that predispose children to act violently. By this standard, verbal abuse, psychological abuse, and physical contact meant in play are not considered violent. Epp and Watkinson (1997:xi) have defined systemic violence in schools as:
Any institutionalized practice or procedure that adversely impacts on disadvantaged individuals or groups by burdening them psychologically, mentally, culturally, spiritually, economically, or physically. It includes practices...