School safety and order are essential conditions for learning but represent a relatively new field of study, stimulated in large part by repeated episodes of school violence that have generated considerable public concern and triggered substantial changes in school discipline and security practices over the past two decades. This article sets the stage for the current special issue of Educational Researcher (ER), in which the study of school violence is recast into the broader and conceptually more fertile framework of school safety and order.Each article addresses key practical questions that map a school safety perspective to multiple bodies of education research as well as to broader transdisciplinary interests.

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Schools are basically safe places for children. School violence and disruption, although in decline through the mid-to late 1990s, remains a concern. National surveys that inform research, policy, and practice have been designed for different purposes and can present conflicting findings. Common standards of risk and harm that could advance policy and practice are lacking. Progress in the field of school safety has been hindered by the lack of a coherent conceptual structure to guide measurement and research. This article identifies some of the conceptual and methodological challenges that must be addressed and calls for a 10-year national strategic plan to improve school safety.

In the September, 2000. issue of Foctts on E.xceptianal Children, we, along with several colleagues, examined .school violence and related disorders through ecological and other perspectives (Leone. Mayer. Malmgren. & Meisei. 2000). That article attempted to move beyond a discussion limited to child-centered characteristics and toward the contexts of children's lives. Our analysis of school violence examined family structure and poverty, exposure to violence in popular tnedia. access to guns, and influences in the education system (e.g., accountability, zero lolcrance) thut might help to explain school violence and disorder. After presenting data on the extent of school violence and disorder, we closed with a discussi

Significant progress has been made in developing models of social information processing, and cognitive-behavioral processes and related interventions. While there has been limited attention to cognitive-behavioral modification (CBM) in the special education literature, the majority of the contributions have come from the fields of school, clinical, and cognitive psychology. Despite well-documented needs of students with emotional/behavioral disorders (EBD) in areas of anger/aggression, anxiety, depression, and research demonstrating the efficacy of CBM interventions in these areas, these disciplines have operated somewhat independently of each other with respect to CBM. This special issue brings together leading scholars from special education and psychology in a collaborative examination of current knowledge on cognitive-behavioral interventions for students displaying specific challenging behaviors.