Keeping Florida Schools Safe

Prevent, prepare, respond and recover from any emergency

Alyssa’s Law

Alyssa’s Law requires all Florida public schools, including charters, to implement a mobile panic alert system capable of connecting diverse emergency services technologies to ensure real-time coordination between multiple first responder agencies.

Such a system, known as “Alyssa’s Alert,” must integrate with local public safety answering point infrastructure to transmit 911 calls and mobile activations. The Florida Legislature has allocated $6.4 million in recurring state funds to ensure every Florida public school has this critical life-saving tool.

Raptor is an approved vendor for Alyssa’s Alert compliance through our mobile panic alert system, Raptor Alert.

Enables activation of a panic alert silently and easily from any hard-wired, wearable, cellular, or wireless device.
Supports standard E911 services, is RapidSOS Ready™, and is fully compatible with all standard Public Safety Answering Points and emergency calling infrastructure.
Caller information is automatically shared with 911 dispatchers, including caller name, callback number, precise location, school name and dispatchable address, and type of emergency.
Situation-specific notifications are sent via text, phone, email, desktop notifications, and push notifications to school and district staff.

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The Florida Model

Effective January 1, 2024

The Florida Harm Prevention and Threat Management Model, known as the Florida Model, aims to help address potential and real threats to schools, but more importantly to intervene early for those individuals who may be on the pathway to violence.

With Raptor StudentSafe™, a 2023 Campus Safety BEST Award Winner for empowering schools with early intervention software, school staff can report all types of concerning student behavior in one central, secure environment.

The Florida Model-approved forms are available within the StudentSafe platform.
Schools can add district-specific guidance to the forms.
Schools can add checks and balances to the forms, including the required review and approval of team decisions by principals and district threat management coordinators.
Schools can include unfounded or low-level cases for a more complete student chronology.
Threat Management teams can access complete student chronologies for more thorough review and decision-making within the required timeframes.
StudentSafe data moves automatically from building to building with a student within the same district. Data can also be shared across staff members when a student is enrolled in more than one school in a district.
Four-dimensional provisioning provides additional peace of mind while working with sensitive student data.

“As we transition to the new Florida Model, Raptor has proven to be an invaluable partner. Their platform's capacity to capture minor concerns, facilitate seamless record transfers between schools, and their proactive support for the new Florida Model will expedite our compliance with the state's updated requirements.”

Family Reunification Plans

Family Reunification plans, as set forth in 6A-1.0018 School Safety Requirements and Monitoring rule, require district school boards to adopt a family reunification plan to reunite students with their families in the event that a school is closed or unexpectedly evacuated due to a natural or manmade disaster. At a minimum, district reunification plans must address:

Identification of potential reunification sites.
Training for employees.
Multiple methods to effectively communicate with family members of students and staff.
Methods to aid law enforcement in student and staff identification.

Connected to your student information system, Raptor Reunification helps reunify students with approved guardians up to 4x faster than paper and pencil methods and is HB 1421 compliant.

Enables scanning of the guardian’s ID to check for status or custodial restrictions.
Records and stores approved guardian signature.
Automatically sends alerts to the student’s other guardians upon successful reunification.
Updates dashboards in real-time and automatically creates summary reports.
Patented workflow is fully aligned to the Standard Reunification Method from The “I Love U Guys” Foundation.

Raptor offers robust training options, including The Raptor Reunification Exercise through our Compliance and Success Program, designed to remove stress and leave your team feeling confident in their abilities to execute this critical function in an actual emergency.

We also partner with The “I Love U Guys” Foundation to deliver a Together Reunification Exercise, T-Rex.

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Best Practices for Coordinating Drills with Emergency Responders

Getting ready for emergencies is an ongoing process. As threats evolve and new technological solutions emerge, there’s a growing need to rethink old safety plans.

School Safety Drills

Florida law requires schools to conduct six emergency drills:

One within the first ten days of school.
The remaining drills must take place at least every forty five days that school is in session.
Four out of six must be active threat drills.
The remaining two can be severe weather, natural disasters, hazardous materials, or reunification.

Raptor Drill Manager enables Florida schools to meet the latest school safety drill requirements, including the ones outlined in House Bill 1473 by:

Allowing users to efficiently schedule, conduct, and track drills.
Providing users access to both district-level and school-level reports that can easily be customized and scheduled for analytical and investigative purposes.
Providing users access to key metrics, like who was accounted for and when, via dashboards that are updated in real-time.

Stronger Connections Grant Program

40 LEAs were recently recommended for funding.

Totaling $53,737,824, the Stronger Connections Grant through the Bipartisan Safer Communities Act (BSCA) provides funds for Florida school districts to provide students with safer learning environments.

Allowable expenses include:

the implementation of schoolwide positive behavioral interventions and supports.
high-quality training for school personnel, related to suicide prevention, crisis management, and conflict resolution techniques.
school-based violence prevention strategies.
and more.

Related Resources

Alyssa's Law in Focus: Enhancing School Safety with Silent Panic Alarms

Join our panel of experts for a deep dive into Alyssa’s Law and how silent panic alert technology enhances K-12 school safety.

How Technology Can Revolutionize Emergency Communication in Schools

Learn how Raptor Connect’s ecosystem of partners can help close communication gaps between schools and first responders.

Highlands County Schools Learned the Efficiency of Raptor Reunification

Learn more about the challenges the district faced—and how Raptor worked with their team to overcome them.

What Our Customers Say

“What stands out the most about Raptor’s Reunification is the ease of use. It really does make the whole process of this potentially chaotic event go smoothly. We’re extremely happy with what we’ve seen so far, and we’re looking forward to—hopefully never needing the use of this—but having the comfort behind us that this is going to be an easier process for us with our partnership with Raptor."

“Raptor’s support is top-notch. They are very responsive. They have a how to / help section, and if you can't figure it out on your own, they will respond to you immediately.”

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- Chris Allen, Crisis Management Technician, Laramie County School District WY

- Michael Barbara, Safety Coordinator, Alhambra (CA) USD

- David Wrzesinski, Director of Safety and Emergency Management, Robinson (TX) ISD

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