This indicator, based on data from the SurveyWorks questionnaire that is sent to students, measures the percentage of students who responded to the questionnaire that they trust a great deal, trust quite a bit, trust somewhat, trust a little bit, or do not trust at all that someone will hear their side of the story in the event of a conflict or problem. The left side of the visualization presents combined results for all three schools, and the right side shows data for respondents at each school. The indicator breaks this data further by student race and ethnicity, gender, and grade level. These breakdowns present student answers as favorable (students who answered “trust a great deal” or “trust quite a bit”) or unfavorable (students who answered “trust somewhat”, “trust a little bit”, and “do not trust at all”).

This indicator shows a trend that as students get further into their education, their feelings that their school community will trust them in the event of a conflict or problem decrease greatly. At the elementary school level, 63% of students responded to this question favorably. Only 49% middle school students and an even lower 26% of high school students responded favorably. While district level data may show a promising number of students replying favorably, once the breakdown by school is done and the higher grade levels are This decrease in trust that a student will have their side of the story heard is fairly even across racial and ethnic groups, genders, and grade levels. 

We know that outside of family supports, students rely on school staff such as teachers, guidance counselors, paraprofessionals, school leaders, and other school employees to support them in the event that a conflict or problem arises. We also know that as students move through their educational career, the stakes only get higher as they think of post-graduation plans. Having this trust that their side of the story may not even be heard, let alone trusted, creates a situation where students may not feel like they have a trusted adult they can go to when they are experiencing any sort of difficulty or conflict. This may lead to feelings of isolation from the school community and can create unsafe situations for students. While this indicator shows that this level of trust that a students’ story will be heard decreases the further they go into their education, it does not tell us why, which may be where efforts need to be focused so this lack of trust can be addressed.