Directions for Completing
the
Summary of Violent and Disruptive Incidents
form
2005-06
Overview
The New York State Education Department’s (SED’s) Uniform Violent and Disruptive Incident Reporting System (VADIR) gathers data on violent and disruptive incidents in schools and uses the information to comply with State and federal reporting requirements and to identify schools as persistently dangerous, as required by the No Child Left Behind Act (NCLB) of 2001. Beginning in 2006, in addition to the list of persistently dangerous schools, the Department has issued a watch list of schools whose number and types of violent incidents warrant concern and increased monitoring, but are not sufficient to identify them as persistently dangerous.
All public schools, boards of cooperative educational services, charter schools, and county vocational education and extension boards are required to maintain individual incident reports on violent and disruptive incidents occurring on school property, which includes incidents occurring in or on a school bus as defined in Vehicle and Traffic Law §142 and at school functions. These individual incident reports are not submitted to SED, but should be retained by the school for six years and be made available for review upon request by SED.
Each fall, school superintendents and chief school officers of charter schools are required to submit to SED a Summary of Violent and Disruptive Incidents report (VADIR Summary Form) for each school in the district or each charter school for the prior school year (July 1st through June 30th). The VADIR Summary Form includes information derived from the individual incident forms, such as tallies of incidents, offenders, and victims by type of incident, as well as other information relating to school safety. School superintendents and chief school officers of charter schools complete the VADIR Summary Form online using the BEDS-IMF system, but SED also makes available a paper version of the form to facilitate recordkeeping and data entry. In many cases school personnel complete the paper form and then forward it to the superintendent for review, certification, and entry of the data into the online BEDS system’s VADIR Summary Form.
Changes to the VADIR Summary Form and Data Collection Process for 2005-06
SED has made minor revisions to the guidance and decision rules for categorizing violent and disruptive incidents. Major changes are described below. Since last year, the Glossary and the Q & A documents have been revised to provide better guidance regarding criteria for determining whether a specific incident is reportable and, if so, in what incident category it should be reported. Please review these documents carefully to ensure you report completely and accurately. In some cases, reporting incidents in the wrong category could result in a school being incorrectly identified as persistently dangerous.
· BOCES now use the online VADIR Summary Form. BOCES are required to submit the VADIR Summary Form. Beginning in 2005-06, the BOCES must submit the VADIR Summary Form online using the BEDS-IMF system. Each BOCES must submit only one VADIR Summary Form compiling information from all of the incidents attributable to all of that BOCES’ sites.
· School districts must submit a VADIR Summary Form. The district’s VADIR Summary Form contains only information about incidents that are reportable, but not attributable to any school or BOCES operating within the district. An example is an assault that occurred on school transportation where the offender was a district student placed in a private school. The incident is reportable and must be attributed to the district rather than to a school. VADIR forms must still be completed for each school in the district.
· New section on unsafe school choice. Item 6 is an expanded set of questions on unsafe school choice. Under the NCLB, schools must allow victims of violent criminal offenses an opportunity to transfer to another school within the district or Local Educational Agency (LEA) if such a transfer is possible (i.e., the district has another school with that grade level). In addition, schools on the list of persistently dangerous schools must offer students an opportunity to transfer to a safe school within the district, including a charter school, if such a transfer opportunity exists. The new questions in Item 6 ask for counts of students offered and accepting transfers under both unsafe school choice transfer provisions.
· Greater clarity regarding incidents that must be reported, even if they did not result in disciplinary action or referral to law enforcement. Incidents in categories 1-8, 14, 15, and 17-19 must be reported regardless of whether the offender was disciplined or referred to law enforcement. Incidents in categories 9-13, 16, and 20 are reportable if the incident resulted in one of the disciplinary consequences listed in Item 1, columns “j” through “o.” If the offender is unknown, offenses in categories 9-13, 16, and 20 are reportable if the incident would have resulted in a disciplinary response if the offender had been identified.
· New item to collect a combined unduplicated count of offenders involved in serious violent incidents. Item 8 is a new item calling for the total number of different individuals involved in serious violent incidents. The categories of serious violent incidents are categories 1-8, plus any incident in categories 9-17 that involved a weapon. For Item 8 only, count each offender only once regardless of how many serious violent incidents the person was involved in as an offender. Treat unknown offenders as separate individuals. (N.b.: the counts of offenders and victims in Item 1 are duplicated counts. That is to say, for Item 1 count each individual each time he or she is an offender or victim.)
·
Weapons
possession incidents: No change for
2005-06, but in 2006-07 weapons found and confiscated through security checks
at building entrances will be reported separately from other weapons possession
offenses. In completing individual
incident reports in 2006-07, indicate whether weapons were confiscated through
security screening systems located at the entrance to the school building. The 2006-07 VADIR Summary Form will distinguish those weapons possession
incidents from others.
Reminders
· Each incident must be reported in only one category. For incidents that fit more than one category, choose the most serious (the category with the lowest number). For example, if a person used intimidation, had a weapon, and stole money from another student (all at the same time), then the incident would involve intimidation, harassment, menacing, or bullying (category 10); robbery (category 3); and weapons possession (category 17). In this case, the incident should be reported as robbery with a weapon because that category is more serious than intimidation, harassment, menacing, or bullying or weapons possession alone.
· Incidents must be reported even if the offender has not been identified. Report these incidents in the appropriate category in column (a) and column (i) (if incident occurred on school transportation), Item 2, Item 4, and Item 5.
·
Schools
reporting no incidents must report zero (0) in categories 1-20 column (a). Questions in Item 2, Item 6, Item 7, and Item
8 must be answered.
· Incidents occurring in the following locations are reportable: on school property, in or on a school bus as defined in Vehicle and Traffic Law §142, and at a school function, regardless of where the school-sponsored or school-authorized extracurricular event or activity takes place, including any event or activity that may take place in another state. Incidents occurring at school bus stops are not reportable under VADIR.
· Use duplicated offender and victim counts in Item 1. Offenders and victims should be counted each time they were involved in an incident. For example, if ten times during the school year a student engaged in reportable bullying or menacing incidents, then each of the ten incidents would figure in the category 10 incident total, and the student would count as ten offenders in the (b) column.
Item-by-Item Instructions
To complete Item
1 (Violent and Disruptive Incidents), sort the Individual VADIR incident forms by the VADIR
Summary Form
categories. Determine the number of
incidents for each category and record them on the VADIR Summary Form. For categories 1–4, 6–13 and 16, indicate the
number of incidents in each category in which a weapon was or was not involved.
For categories 1–17 and 20, indicate the number of incidents in each category
that were drug or alcohol related. Use category
17 to report counts of incidents involving weapons possession only. Use category 18 to report counts of incidents
involving only the possession, use, or sale of drugs and category 19 to report
counts of incidents involving only the possession, use, or sale of
alcohol. Use category 20 to report
non-violent incidents that disrupt the educational process and are not
reportable in any of the other categories.
Incidents in categories 1-8, 14, 15, and 17-19 must be reported
regardless of whether the offender was disciplined or referred to law
enforcement.
To complete Item 2 (Other Information Regarding Intimidation, Harassment, Menacing, or Bullying), report any alleged incident of intimidation, harassment, menacing, or bullying of students or staff reported to the school principal or other school administrator responsible for student discipline by any source, such as a staff member, student, parent, or other concerned citizen, that was not reported under category 10. Incidents of intimidation, harassment, menacing, or bullying that resulted in a disciplinary action listed in columns j-o should be reported under category 10. Incidents that did not result in a listed disciplinary action must be reported under Item 2, page 3 if they reached the attention of the principal or person responsible for discipline in the building. No incident reported under category 10 should also be reported in Item 2.
To complete Item 3 (Incidents Where the Offender is Not an Enrolled Student), report the number of staff or any paid employee of the school or district or other offenders not enrolled in the school involved in a violent or disruptive incident. Report staff or other student offenders referred to the school of enrollment, law enforcement, or other disciplinary action.
To complete Item 4 (Location, Time, and Nature of
Incidents), report the number of the incidents reported in categories 1–20 of the VADIR Summary
Form by location and time and the number of these incidents that
were gang or bias related. The sum of incidents
reported by location (4a+4b) must equal the sum of those reported by time
(4c+4d).
Note: For reporting purposes, school transportation
is considered "on school property."
Incidents occurring on school transportation to and from school are
reported before or after regular school hours unless the incident occurred
during regular school hours.
To complete Item 5 (Other Information Regarding Incidents Involving Weapons) For every incident involving weapons use or possession (categories 1–4, 6–13, 16 or 17) provide counts of:
· the incidents by weapon type; and
· students who were suspended or transferred to alternative programs for bringing a firearm to school.
Each weapon type is numbered. If an incident involved multiple weapon types, count the incident under each applicable weapon type. For example, if an incident involved both a handgun (1) and a knife (4), count the incident in the handgun (1) category and in the knife (4) category. Do not count any weapons incident more than once in any weapon category.
To complete Item
6 (Victims of Violent Criminal Offenses), report in 6(a) the number of
students who were victims of a violent criminal offense pursuant to the NCLB. (Refer to the Q & A document, section E, question 8 for more
information.) In 6(b) report the number
of students in part (a) who were offered a transfer to another school in the
district. In 6(c) report the number of
students in part (b) who accepted the offer and transferred to another
school. If the school was on the list of
persistently dangerous schools during the 2005-06 school year, then report in
6(d) the number of students offered a transfer to a safe school within the
district. If the school was not on the
list of persistently dangerous schools during 2005-06, leave the item blank. In 6(e) report the number of students in part
(d) who accepted the offer and transferred to another school in the
district.
To complete Item
7 (Police or Safety Officer in the School), indicate with a check (Ö) whether a police or other safety officer is
present in the school on a regularly scheduled basis and whether that officer
provided information for this report.
To complete Item
8 (Unduplicated Offender Count for Serious Incidents), report the
number of unique individuals who were offenders involved in serious violent
incidents. The categories of serious
violent incidents for the purpose of completing Item 8 are categories 1-8, plus any incident in categories 9-17 that involved a
weapon. Count each offender only once
regardless of the number of serious violent incidents in which the person was
involved as an offender. Treat unknown
offenders as separate individuals.
To complete Item
9, fill in the school contact information on the last page of the VADIR Summary
Form and send the form to the school superintendent for the
superintendent’s review and certification.
The superintendent should complete the Unsafe School Choice Certification question by indicating whether or
not the district offered an opportunity to transfer to another school within
the district or LEA, including a charter school, to students who were a victim
of a violent criminal offense and to students attending a school on the list of
persistently dangerous schools as required by law.
Links to Additional Guidance and Resources
VADIR Glossary: http://www.emsc.nysed.gov/irts/violence-data/2006/glossary.htm
Frequently Asked Questions:
http://www.emsc.nysed.gov/sss/SDFSCA/UVIRQ&AJuly282006html.htm
Violent and Disruptive Incident Data Collection and Reporting:
http://www.emsc.nysed.gov/irts/violence-data/home.shtml
BEDS-IMF Online Manual (explains how to access the online BEDS and VADIR forms: http://www.emsc.nysed.gov/irts/beds/2006/Instructions/BEDS-IMF-OnlineManual.htm
BEDS Data Collection: http://www.emsc.nysed.gov/irts/beds/home.shtml
Center for School Safety: http://www.mhric.org/scss/aboutus.html
For additional information on school safety, contact Greg Bayduss at 518/486-7327 or gbayduss@mail.nysed.gov
For additional information on VADIR data collection, contact Susan VanDeventer at 518/402-5356 or svandeve@mail.nysed.gov
For general information on the State Education Department’s Information and Reporting Services unit, call 518/474-7965 or 518/474-3875.