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Nearly $190 million awarded in grant funding for improving school safety
The Department of Justice has awarded nearly $190 million in grant funding to improve the safety of schools across the country. Awarded by the Department’s Office of Justice Programs (OJP) and Office of Community Oriented Policing Services (COPS), the grants will help schools with the following goals:
- institute safety measures in and around schools
- support school violence prevention efforts
- provide training to school personnel and students
- implement evidence-based threat assessments
- fund research and evaluation on the causes and consequences of school violence
These funds can be used to implement supports for student behavior, wellbeing, and violence prevention as well as options for enhancing districts’ emergency management software and protocols.
Funding support for student behavior, wellbeing, and violence prevention
The following grants include allowances for early intervention software like Raptor StudentSafe, which helps schools recognize, document, support and manage the wellbeing of individual students.
- The Bureau of Justice Assistance (BJA) awarded 82 grants through the STOP School Violence Program totaling almost $87 million which are intended to support training and education for school personnel and students on preventing violence against others and themselves.
- An additional $3 million supports specialized training and technical assistance to help students and teachers recognize and prevent acts of school violence.
- The OJP Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention (OJJDP) has awarded nearly $25 million through the 2022 Enhancing School Capacity To Address Youth Violence Grant to support evidence-based youth violence prevention and intervention programs in school settings.
- OJP’s National Institute of Justice’s grants—totaling more than $1.7 million—will help recipients measure the impact of threat assessments on school safety, examine the root causes of school violence, and explore how police reforms in school environments affect students’ experiences.
Raptor StudentSafe integrates safeguarding and behavioral threat assessment (BTA) workflows in one intuitive and connected platform. The software gives authorized staff a holistic view, centralized communications, and a full chronology of observances, incidents, actions, and responses.
Funding support for managing school security and coordinating emergency response
The COPS Office is awarding nearly $72 million under its School Violence Prevention Program (SVPP). Funds can be used for evidence-based school safety programs that include one or more of the following:
- Coordination with local law enforcement;
- Acquisition and installation of technology for expedited notification of local law enforcement during an emergency; and
- Any other measure that, in the determination of the director of the COPS Office, may provide a significant improvement in security.
Raptor Emergency Management allows schools to coordinate, communicate, and comply to better manage their security:
- Coordinate protocols during and after events
- Customize Raptor to your emergency protocols to ensure everyone stays aligned;
- Automatically sync with your student information system; and
- Reunite students with approved guardians up to 4 times faster.
- Communicate with emergency responders
- Access Raptor from any web-enabled device;
- Integrates directly with 911 and provides enriched data to first responders; and
- Get the right help for small incidents and school-wide emergencies from anywhere on campus.
- Comply with safety best practices
- Create muscle memory by practicing safety drills;
- Know exactly where students, staff, and visitors are—and their status—during emergencies;
- 100% aligned with the “I Love U Guys” Foundation® protocols; and
- Comply with state mandates like Alyssa’s Law.
Raptor can help
Founded in 2002, Raptor has partnered with over 52,000 schools globally, including over 5,000 K-12 U.S. school districts, to provide integrated visitor, volunteer, emergency management, and early intervention software and services that cover the full spectrum of school and student safety.
Want to learn more? Speak with a Raptor specialist to discuss how Raptor aligns with these grants’ goals—just fill out this form to get started.
Related Resources
Guide to K-12 Emergency Management
Proven Strategies to Protect Your School
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