Victimized Teachers’ Perceptions of Procedural Justice and the Impact on Satisfaction with School Responses

ABSTRACT

Victimization of teachers is an area of growing concern for administrators and policymakers. Recent research has increased the understanding of the prevalence and negative consequences of teacher victimization; however, one gap in the literature involves understanding the quality of treatment when victimizations are reported to school administrators. The present research attempts to fill the gap by applying procedural justice theory to understand how elements of school responses to victimization events affect teachers’ satisfaction with the process. Data from teachers among 50 largest school districts across the nation were used to identify 636 theft, sexual harassment, and physical assault incidents reported to school administration. Teachers’ satisfaction with the school response was modeled using measures derived from distributive and procedural justice theoretical frameworks applied to administrator actions. Results indicate that procedural justice is an important dimension of school response and influential on teachers’ reported satisfaction with how victimization events were handled.

KEYWORDS:

• Victim satisfaction
• procedural justice
• distributive justice
• victimization
• school violence
• teacher victimization

Acknowledgments

The authors would like to thank the thousands of teachers that have participated in this research project. This research would not be possible without their willingness to contribute their experiences and views.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Notes

1. As described, the research design anticipated sampling teachers from all 50 of the largest school districts. This became impossible, however, due to several technological barriers, which we strongly surmise to be Independent School Districts’ e-mail firewall systems blocking e-mails from Qualtrics, or survey e-mails being directed to teachers’ junk folders. Thus, no or extremely small numbers of teachers in 12 out of the 50 largest independent school districts participated in the wave I survey. Due to COVID-19 travel restrictions, our ability to ascertain or obtain alternative electronic access was severely curtailed.

Additional information

Funding

This project was supported by the National Institute of Justice, Office of Justice Programs, U.S. Department of Justice (Award No. 2020-CK-BX-0004). The opinions, findings, and conclusions or recommendations expressed in this publication/program/exhibition are those of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect those of the Department of Justice.

Notes on contributors

John McCluskey

John McCluskey is a Professor in the Department of Criminal Justice at the Rochester Institute of Technology. His research areas include teacher victimization, procedural justice, and body-worn cameras and their impact on policing and police research.

Byongook Moon

Byongook Moon is a Professor in the Department of Criminology and Criminal Justice, at the University of Texas San Antonio. His research focuses on violence directed against teachers, investigating the prevalence and risk factors of teacher victimization, as well as examining school responses to incidents of teacher victimization.

Guan Saw

Guan Saw is an Associate Professor in the School of Educational Studies at Claremont Graduate University. His research areas include teacher victimization, educational inequalities, STEM education and workforce development, and research/evaluation methods.