Revealed: The Hidden Dangers Facing Britain's School Crossing Guards
A major investigation by The Associated Press and Cox Media Group has uncovered a disturbing pattern of danger and neglect facing school crossing guards, with many suffering serious injuries or even death while protecting children.
The probe began when Ron Nixon, AP’s director of the local investigative reporting programme, received an unusual postcard from San Francisco highlighting the perils crossing guards face. "Just as I was about to throw it out, I saw a couple of things that were interesting," Nixon recalled. "Once I did a little Googling, I realised this might be something significant."
A Monumental Data Challenge
Investigators faced immediate obstacles because no government entity at any level tracks crossing guard injuries or fatalities. This forced the team to build their own database from scratch, partnering with Cox Media Group's eight television stations to gather records from nearly 200 police departments nationwide.
Dasia Garner, an AP reporter who joined through the Ida B. Wells Society Investigative Reporting Internship, explained the difficulties: "The data is underreported. We had to really find how many people were hurt, how many people were killed on duty. We ran into many complications because many reports did not have names or follow-ups about whether drivers were charged."
The resulting database reveals that at least 230 school crossing guards across 37 states and Washington, D.C., were struck by vehicles over the past decade. Even more alarming, nearly three dozen were killed while performing their duties.
Accountability Gap: Drivers Rarely Face Consequences
The investigation uncovered a troubling pattern of minimal consequences for drivers who hit crossing guards. Analysis of 183 incidents where police outcomes could be determined shows that nearly half resulted only in traffic citations, while about a quarter of drivers faced no penalties whatsoever. Only a quarter of cases led to criminal charges.
Garner noted that crossing guards feel particularly vulnerable: "They don't feel protected. They feel as if they're doing just an auxiliary service that some police officers just don't want to do." Many guards reported that drivers simply disregard their authority, creating dangerous situations daily.
Systemic Solutions and State Examples
Crossing guards have proposed practical solutions, including body cameras to document incidents and increased police presence in school zones. "Body cams will help because when you're out there, it's so hard to catch these license plates," one guard explained.
The investigation found that only two states—New Jersey and Massachusetts—have made serious efforts to track crossing guard safety. New Jersey operates an initiative that conducts periodic inspections of school zones and implements safety improvements where violations are found.
Statistical analysis places crossing guards and road construction flaggers in the top fifth for workplace death rates, on par with power line installers and air transportation workers. Despite this danger, the Bureau of Labour Statistics doesn't publish specific fatality rates for crossing guards, grouping them with other occupations.
Ultimately, crossing guards hope drivers will begin to value their safety as much as the children's lives they protect every day.
