Students who believe educators take their safety concerns seriously are more likely to feel safe during the school day, a new survey finds.
The survey of nearly 200,000 3rd to 12th grade students and 20,000 educators was conducted during the 2024-25 school year by YouthTruth, an initiative of the Center for Effective Philanthropy that works with districts to track data related to school climate and student belonging. Results were weighted by race and ethnicity to ensure nationally representative results.
The data on the link between safety and relationships come as schools struggle to carve out portions of their increasingly limited budgets for school security measures, safety training, and mental health programs.
“This finding suggests that safety is not only about physical infrastructure or emergency protocols, but that it is also relational,” said Camilla Valerio, an analyst for YouthTruth and the lead author of the report, released Feb. 24.
YouthTruth asks a set of core questions to students at participating schools and adds a new set of questions related to a focus topic every year to explore different facets of their perceptions, Valerio said.
Here are four key findings related to this year’s topic, student safety.
1. Students feel safer when they believe adults are listening
Fifty-six percent of students in grades 6-12 said they feel safe during the school day. That figure was much higher, 71%, among students who agreed with the statement “my school takes my safety concerns seriously.”
“When students feel listened to and taken seriously, it builds trust,” Valerio said. “And trust appears to be closely tied to whether students experience their school as safe. For schools, that means improving safety may also require strengthening systems for listening and responsiveness, not just adding new security measures.”
Elementary school students answered slightly different questions related to safety. Sixty percent of elementary students said they feel “very safe” during school, and 79 percent agreed that “adults at school care about keeping them safe.”
2. Adults are more likely than students to believe schools take their concerns seriously
“Students and staff don’t always experience the sense of being heard in the same way,” the report says. “In both middle and high schools, most adults feel their schools listen to safety concerns, while many students do not experience the same level of responsiveness.”
Adults were more likely than students to agree than students to agree their schools prepared them for situations like security threats and natural disasters. While 83% of high school staff and 85% of middle school staff agreed their school has “provided clear safety instructions for security threats,” just 59% of high school students and 66% of middle school students agreed with that statement.
Asked if their school provided clear instructions for natural disasters, 80% of high school staff and 81% of middle school staff agreed, compared to 45% of high school students and 51% of middle school students.
3. Most students feel safe in classrooms; fewer feel safe on school buses and in bathrooms
Asked about a variety of locations within a school, students were most likely to say they feel safe in the classroom and least likely to say they feel safe on the school bus.
The data show that students feel the most vulnerable in transitional spaces with less structure and adult supervision, Valerio said.
The results varied depending on factors like students’ race, gender, and sexuality. Among the most pronounced differences: While 52% of boys who don’t identify as LGBTQ+ said they feel safe in the bathroom, 40% of LGBTQ+ boys reported feeling safe there.
4. Students of color are more likely to worry about school safety
Overall, 19% of secondary students said they worry often about their safety in school, but the data varied by race and ethnicity.
Twenty-six percent of Black students and 24% of American Indian, Alaska Native, or Indigenous students reported worrying often about their safety. That’s compared to 20% of Latino students, 16% of Asian students, and 14% of white students.
Twenty-seven percent of English learners reported worrying often about safety compared to 16% of their non-English-learner peers.
