The Good School Toolkit for Reducing Physical Violence from School Staff to Primary School Students

Violence against children from school staff is widespread in various settings but few interventions address this. This evaluation tested whether the Good School Toolkit—a complex behavioral intervention designed by Ugandan not-for profit organization Raising Voices—could reduce physical violence from school staff towards Ugandan primary school children.

The evaluation included random selection of 42 primary schools from 151 schools in Luwero District, Uganda, which had more than 40 primary 5 students and no existing government interventions. 21 schools were randomly assigned to receive the Good School Toolkit and 21 were a waitlisted control group (to receive intervention later). The intervention was implemented from September 2012 to April 2014. (Summary)At 18-month follow-up, 3820 (92·4%) of 4138 randomly sampled students participated in a cross-sectional survey. Prevalence of past week physical violence was lower in the intervention schools (595/1921, 31·0%) than in the control schools (924/1899, 48·7%; odds ratio 0·40, 95% CI 0·26–0·64, p<0·0001). No adverse events related to the intervention were detected, but 434 children were referred to child protective services because of what they disclosed in the follow-up survey. (Summary)