tion and the various methods and means that can be taken to prevent these types of violence in schools. Understanding the different types of violence is, therefore, an important part of creating and developing means of combating violent behavior in schools.
             There are many studies, reports and data sources that indicate that there has been an increase in violent crimes in our schools. One study states that "Every year, 3 million young people in the United States fall victim to crimes at school. Almost 2 million of these incidents involve violence" (The Challenge of School Violence). However, most crimes that occur at schools are classified as minor assaults or lesser crimes. Nevertheless there are indications that in recent years there have been increases in more serious crimes and manifestations of more aggressive forms of crime in the school area; for example, "...in two recent academic years, a total of 85 young people died violently in U.S. schools. Seventy-five percent of these incidents involved firearms" (The Challenge of School Violence). The statistics on the subject show that the cycle of violence in schools varies. For example, the rate of violent crime was very high in the 1970s in U.S. schools, with numerous reports of assaults, robberies, and vandalism (The Challenge of School Violence). This rate of crime and violence dropped markedly but was later seen to increase in the 1990s (The Challenge of School Violence). One study in the later 1990's entitled: School violence: prevalence and intervention strategies for at-risk adolescents (Cirillo et al., 1998) found that "Violent crimes (murder, rape, robbery, assault, burglary, larceny/ theft, and arson) are at some of the highest levels in history for adolescents. (Cirillo et al., 1998, p. 319)
             However, it must also be noted that there are many conflicting opinions about the levels of violent crime. There are studies that claim that in fact there has been a decrease i...