Teachers Supporting Teachers: A Social Network Perspective on Collegial Stress Support and Emotional Wellbeing Among Elementary and Middle School Educators

School mental health practitioners and researchers are increasingly concerned about educator job-related stress and its implications for teacher burnout, teaching efficacy, turnover, and student outcomes. Educators’ collegial networks in their schools are natural resources for stress support, yet little is known about the extent to which educators seek support from their colleagues in managing their stress and whether these relationships promote their emotional wellbeing. Utilizing peer nomination and self-report data from 370 educators in 17 elementary and middle schools, we found patterns in whom educators nominated as a source of stress support. Specifically, educators more often nominated colleagues who worked in the same role, grade, and/or subject, and those similar in age and who had similar or more experience. Furthermore, men and educators of color more often nominated same-gender and same-race colleagues, respectively, whereas these trends were not observed for women or White educators. However, the prevalence of these characteristics among colleagues nominated as a source of stress support was not often significantly associated with educators’ stress and burnout. Rather, educators’ level of burnout was positively related to the burnout among those in their stress support networks. In addition, educators’ stress and burnout were positively related to the stress and burnout of their colleagues with whom they spent the most time. These findings highlight how educators’ perceptions of stress and burnout may be shared within their collegial networks and have implications for a role for colleagues in teacher stress-reduction and wellbeing-focused interventions.

Teacher-Student Incongruence in Perceptions of School Equity: Associations with Student Connectedness in Middle and High Schools

BACKGROUND

School equity refers to the extent to which students are treated fairly, ensuring that each student receives what they need to be successful. School staff can play a vital role in creating an equitable school climate for adolescents, but little is known about how staff perceive equity in their school and how this in turn may relate to students' perceptions. This study sought to explore congruence between teacher and student perceptions of school equity and how congruence or incongruence related to students' sense of connectedness to school.

METHODS

Data for the study came from the Maryland Safe and Supportive Schools Climate Survey, which was administered online to 5523 school staff and 59,218 students across 104 middle and high schools.

RESULTS

Multilevel models indicated that, compared to high staff and high student ratings, there was lower connectedness among the schools with low staff, low student ratings of equity as well as the schools with high staff, low student and low staff, high student ratings of equity.

CONCLUSIONS

The findings suggest that staff perceptions of school equity are often higher than students and incongruence in perceptions may have a negative impact on students' connection to school.

Annual Research Review: Youth firearm violence disparities in the United States and implications for prevention

OBJECTIVE

Research has identified the United States (U.S.) as a global outlier in its firearm ownership rates, with a correspondingly higher risk of youth firearm violence compared to other countries. The relative extent of disparities in youth firearm violence within the U.S. has been less clear. Little is known about factors in the social ecology driving these disparities and whether current firearm violence prevention approaches sufficiently address them.

METHOD

Applying a health disparities framework, we synthesized epidemiological, sociological, and prevention science literatures, emphasizing structural inequalities in youth sociocultural positionality in life course developmental context. We also highlighted findings from national injury data and other studies regarding the magnitude and impacts of youth firearm violence disparities.

RESULTS

The burden of firearm violence varied markedly at intersections of gender, race, place, developmental stage, and homicidal or suicidal intent. Firearm homicide among Black boys and young men (ages 15-24) was at outlier levels - many times greater than the rates of any other demographic group, developmental stage, or violence intent, particularly in urban settings. Recent research has operationalized structural racism and implicated historically racialized spaces as a root cause of this disparity. In contrast, elevated firearm suicide rates were found among Native and White boys and young men in rural settings; firearm-related cultural attitudes and gender socialization were points of consideration to explain these disparities. We highlighted research-based youth firearm violence preventive interventions, and emphasized gaps in efforts focused on structural and sociocultural factors.

CONCLUSIONS

More explicit attention to reducing firearm homicide among Black boys and young men and firearm suicide among Native and rural White boys and young men is urgently needed and has potential to substantially lower overall rates of firearm violence in the U.S.

Buffering Effects of Racial Discrimination on School Engagement: The Role of Culturally Responsive Teachers and Caring School Police

BACKGROUND

Urban black adolescents' wellbeing in the early high school years can be negatively impacted by exposure to racial discrimination. These impacts may be buffered by supportive relationships with adults at school. We considered both the protective and promotive effects of culturally responsive teachers and caring school police on school engagement for students exposed to racial discrimination across settings.

METHOD

This study leveraged baseline student report from a sample of urban, predominantly black high school students with elevated teacher-rated levels of aggressive behavior (N = 397 9th graders; 91.2% black; 50.4% male; J = 10 schools). Using a path model with full-information maximum likelihood estimation, we examined the associations of racial discrimination, teacher cultural responsiveness, and school police caring in relation to school engagement and school disconnection, adjusting for covariates, including family racial socialization.

RESULTS

Frequency of racial discrimination was significantly associated with lower school engagement and greater school disconnection. Teacher cultural responsiveness was significantly, favorably associated with all outcomes. Police caring had no significant direct associations; however, there were moderation effects. When police caring was below average, increased racial discrimination was associated with significantly poorer attitudes toward school.

CONCLUSIONS

Findings suggested that students' perceptions of school police caring may buffer links between racial discrimination experiences and school disconnection. Moreover, students who perceive that their teachers are culturally responsive may feel more engaged at school. Interventions to promote teachers' and school police officers' cultural responsiveness and caring may improve engagement among at-risk urban youth who experience racial discrimination.

Triangulating School Climate: Areas of Convergence and Divergence Across Multiple Levels and Perspectives

Students often have differing perceptions of their school's climate. Although these subjective perceptions can be meaningful outcome predictors, discrepancies create challenges for those seeking to globally characterize or intervene to improve the climate of a school. Trained, independent  observers can provide insights on perceptible and ostensibly malleable aspects of the school; however, the extent to which these observations help us to understand differences in students' report of school climate has not been examined. To study this, we assessed convergence and divergence between independent observers' assessments and students' perceptions of school climate at the classroom and school levels. Data come from the Maryland Safe and Supportive Schools Initiative (MDS3), which included 20,647 students and observations of 303 teachers in 50 high schools. Students responded to survey items regarding safety, engagement, and environment; independent observers assessed teachers' classroom practices and the school physical environment. A three-level model partitioned variance to the individual, classroom, and school levels. The variance in students' climate perceptions was primarily between students, with most classroom and school intraclass correlation coefficients (ICCs) ranging from 0.01 to 0.08, though one was as high as 0.20; however, observations explained large percentages of between-school variation in climate (58%-91%). Findings suggest the potential utility of outside observations for explaining school-level variation in school climate to inform decision-making and future research.

A multilevel analysis of racial discipline disproportionality: A focus on student perceptions of academic engagement and disciplinary environment

Excessive use of exclusionary school discipline with Black students is a persistent, systemic problem in U.S. schools with potential to affect students' perceptions of their school. For example, students may notice racial differences in out-of-school suspensions, which may relate to how academically engaged they feel and the extent to which they view the school's disciplinary environment as positive. The current study investigated school-level racial discipline disproportionality and observed classroom-level, positive behavior supports in relation to student perceptions of academic engagement and school disciplinary environment by fitting a series of three-level models, which included data on students (N = 17,115), classrooms (J = 310), and schools (K = 53). Two metrics of discipline disproportionality were used (i.e., the risk ratio and the risk difference) and moderation was examined through cross-level interactions. Results indicated that, regardless of race, students perceived the disciplinary environment as significantly less favorable in schools with greater racial discipline disproportionality when measured by the risk ratio, but not when measured by the risk difference. Using different disproportionality metrics in education research has important implications for policies and practices to identify and address the issue. How discipline disparities relate to the way that students perceive the disciplinary environment will likely inform intervention efforts for school psychologists.

A Cross-National Comparison of Risk Factors for Teen Dating Violence in Mexico and the United States

Involvement in dating violence has been linked with negative health outcomes including depressive symptomology, substance use, and later expressions of aggressing and victimizing behaviors. Less is known about the prevalence and mental health correlates of teen dating violence in countries like Mexico where adult partner violence is high. Additional research on teen dating violence is also needed, as it may be an important precursor to adult partner violence and linked to other mental health problems. The current study used self-report ratings to assess the similarities and differences in risk factors associated with dating violence among middle school students in Mexico and the United States. The US sample (N_us = 15,099; M_us = 12.8; 49.5% female) included non-Hispanic Caucasian (24.9%), Hispanic American (20.3%), and African American (24.2%) adolescents. The Mexican sample (N_Mexico = 2211; M_Mexico = 13.67; 51% female) included 93.1% adolescents of Hispanic or Latin descent. Logistic regressions showed that dating violence victimization was reported at similar rates in the cross-national samples, though exposure to risk factors like deviant peers and substance use differed significantly by country. Our analyses indicated that, although the country of residence was not significantly associated with dating violence victimization, the strength of the association between some known risk factors and dating violence victimization varied as a function of nationality, such that there was a significant interaction between country of residence, Mexico or the US, and experiencing internalizing symptoms on experiencing physical dating violence victimization. This study contributes to the growing body of literature on dating violence, both inside and outside the US.