In the 2017-18 school year, 3,482 public school students brought a firearm to or possessed a firearm at their school, according to the latest Indicators of School Crime and Safety.
The joint report by the National Center for Education Statistics and the Bureau of Justice Statistics says that for the entire United States, that number equates to 6.9 per 100,000 students.
The highest incidence per 100,000 students of firearm possession at school was in Arkansas, where 29.8 per 100,000 students had brought a firearm to school.
Here are the 10 states with the highest incidence per 100,000 students:
StateIncidence per 100,000 students Arkansas 29.8 Louisiana 25.0 New Mexico 17.3 North Dakota 16.1 District of Columbia 16.0 South Carolina 15.0 Hawaii 14.4 Washington 14.0 Tennessee 12.8 South Dakota 11.6
Mike Kennedy has been writing about education forAmerican School & Universitysince 1999. He also has reported on schools and other topics for The Chicago Tribune, The Kansas City Star, The Kansas City Times and City News Bureau of Chicago. He is a graduate of Michigan State University.
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