Over the past decade, schools have invested billions of dollars in safety infrastructure, from surveillance systems and controlled entry points to threat assessment software and emergency preparedness planning. These all play a critical role in protecting students and staff, but safety inside a school building is not defined by infrastructure alone.
Safety systems reach their full potential only when the people inside the building trust them, understand them, and feel comfortable raising concerns when something doesn’t feel right. For many students, that sense of trust and connection is still missing.
A new national report from YouthTruth, School Safety, Security, & Emergency Preparedness: Understanding and Acting on How Students Experience Safety, analyzes responses from nearly 200,000 students and over 19,000 educators. Among its findings: nearly half of secondary students report that they do not feel safe during the school day.
For school leaders, the takeaway is clear. Effective safety planning depends not only on physical security measures, but also on whether students feel heard, included, and taken seriously when they raise concerns.
One of the most striking data points in the report isn't about emergency drills or protocols; it's about listening.
Among secondary students who believe their school takes their safety concerns seriously, 71% also report feeling safe during the school day. The inverse is also telling: among students who feel their concerns are dismissed or ignored, only 6% report feeling safe.
As YouthTruth lead researcher Camilla Valerio notes, "Schools must respond by pairing safety planning with intentional efforts to listen to students, build trust and include student voices in safety decisions."
This doesn't mean every safety concern can or will be immediately resolved. It does suggest, however, that genuinely hearing students and acting on their concerns functions as a safety intervention in its own right.
Adults in a school building are far more likely to feel that safety concerns are taken seriously, because they typically are. Students, whose concerns are more easily dismissed or overlooked, tell a different story.
The YouthTruth report found that 82% of middle school staff agree that their school takes safety concerns seriously– but only 65% of students feel the same way. In high school, the divide is even wider: 79% of staff feel their safety concerns are taken seriously, versus 59% of students.
This suggests that what adults see as a responsive, well-functioning safety culture may not match what students actually experience day to day. Physical safety infrastructure is a critical piece of the puzzle, but a student who doesn't feel comfortable raising a concern is less likely to do so. Sometimes it's a tip passed to a teacher, or a concern voiced quietly after class, that can prevent something worse.
Ask most administrators where students feel safest at school, and classrooms are the obvious answer. The data confirms it, as 67% of secondary students report feeling safe during class. Step outside that classroom door, and that quickly changes.
Only 57% feel safe in the hallways. Half feel safe in school bathrooms. On school buses, just 25% of students report feeling safe– meaning most students are spending part of their school day in a space where they feel exposed and unprotected.
Hallways, buses, and bathrooms present different safety challenges than classrooms. They are transitional or shared spaces that naturally have less direct supervision. In the case of school bathrooms, privacy is essential, which means traditional monitoring and security measures are limited by design.
That makes it even more important for students to feel comfortable reporting concerns and confident that adults will take those reports seriously. Safety planning in these spaces often depends less on visibility and more on trust, communication, and clear pathways for students to speak up when something feels wrong.
Safety anxiety is widespread, but it is not experienced equally. The YouthTruth data reveals significant disparities across race, language background, and identity.
Among Caucasian students, 14% report worrying often about their safety at school. That number rises considerably for other groups:
These differences likely reflect a combination of factors that may include disparities in lived experience, exposure to bullying or harassment, and differences in how supported students feel when raising concerns. In some cases, these perceptions may signal gaps in protection, support resources, or reporting systems that do not feel equally accessible to all students.
For school leaders, it is important to recognize that safety is experienced differently across student populations. Effective safety planning must account for those differences, ensuring that the students who face the greatest risks– or feel the least supported– are not overlooked. Equity and safety cannot be treated as separate conversations.
When it comes to emergency protocols, what staff believe they've communicated and what students have actually retained are two very different things.
Out of the surveyed high schools, 83% of staff agree their school has provided clear safety instructions for security threats. Only 59% of students agree. For natural disasters, that gap grows: 80% of staff versus just 45% of students feel adequately prepared. Similar patterns appear in middle schools.
The reasons for this gap likely vary from school to school, from how protocols are taught, to how often they're reinforced, and whether students have enough context to actually absorb and retain what they're being told. Addressing it is unlikely to come from a one-size-fits-all training approach.
Instead, closing the gap often begins with a simple but important step: asking students how safety information is being communicated and what would make those conversations more effective. When students are part of that dialogue, schools can better understand what messages are resonating, what is being missed, and how preparedness efforts can be strengthened.
One the most important insights the YouthTruth report offers is this: students are not passive recipients of safety systems. They're active participants in school culture, and are capable contributors during crises.
After California's Eaton wildfire in 2025, Pasadena City College converted part of its campus into a resource hub for displaced families. With local K-12 schools closed for weeks, many of the volunteers were high school students.
"They weren't in school for a long time. They were sitting there for days or weeks without anything to do. So it became this outlet,” said Que Dang, Executive Director of Student Equity and Success at PCC. “They can leave and say, ‘I helped one person.’”
This is a reminder that students aren't just the people schools are trying to protect. They're capable of contributing to safety culture and processes, too. When students have a seat at the safety planning table, they're more invested, more aware, and bring a different perspective that adults might not consider.
Closing the listening gap requires both culture and infrastructure working together. On the culture side, that means creating environments where students feel genuinely safe raising concerns. On the infrastructure side, it means giving them accessible, low-barrier ways to do so.
Some schools address this by implementing accessible safety tools that allow students and staff to submit tips or report concerns directly to school administrators, removing the social risk that may otherwise keep students silent. In some cases, this may include mobile safety platforms that allow discreet reporting. In others, particularly where schools have limited or banned phone use during the day, it may involve alternatives such as computer-based reporting tools or wall-mounted alert buttons placed throughout the building.
When these tools also house emergency procedures, safety resources, or reporting channels in one place, students are not just being encouraged to participate in safety culture. They are being given practical, accessible ways to do it.
Many school leaders are already doing an enormous amount to strengthen safety– balancing evolving expectations, new legislation, limited resources, and the day-to-day realities of running a school. Data like the YouthTruth findings are not meant to suggest schools are falling short, but to offer insight into how existing efforts are experienced by students.
In many ways, this process mirrors emergency response itself. Effective incident management relies on a feedback loop: gathering information, evaluating conditions, and adjusting the response. Preparedness works the same way. Listening to students helps schools understand what is working, what may be missing, and where safety strategies can be strengthened.
With that mindset, the report highlights several questions for district and school leaders to consider:
Safety infrastructure matters. Strong protocols matter. What this report makes clear, though, is that neither reaches its full potential without the trust and participation of the students those systems are designed to protect.