Montgomery County Only School that has Comprehensive School Safety Reports!

School safety reports, there ought to be a federal law mandating them, Montgomery County planned report should be considered a model.

The annual School Safety Report, slated for publication in Montgomery starting in the 2008-09 academic year, will place the county almost alone among Maryland and Northern Virginia school systems in reporting detailed school crime statistics to the public, according to education leaders and lawmakers. In much of this region, as in much of the nation, comprehensive reports on weapons, drugs and sex in individual public schools simply don't exist.

They ought to be, and widely available to the public.

Kenneth Trump, a national authority on school safety who testified before Congress on Monday, says the underreporting of disciplinary incidents in area schools is part of "a historical culture of downplay, deny, deflect and defend when it comes to publicly acknowledging and reporting school crimes." It's driven, experts say, by an overarching concern among school principals to protect their image and that of their school.

Probably the threat of a bad reputation would motivate school administrators to make their schools safe.