Safe-School Plan

Safe-school planning gives each community an opportunity to develop its own unique strategy for addressing safety issues such as school-crime tracking and reporting; designing of a safe school environment; school staff screening and selection; staff in-service training; parent, student and community involvement; and extracurricular activities.

Stephens (1995) identifies elements that are important to a safe-school plan:

"There is no specific formula that outlines everything that a safe school should entail. Rather, it is more appropriate to identify an array of potential areas that should be addressed. . . . These may include:
• Public awareness

• Curriculum focusing on pro-social skills and conflict resolution

• Behavior/conduct/discipline codes

• Campus supervision

• Crisis management and emergency evacuation

• Attendance

• Truancy prevention

• Drug prevention

• Interagency partnerships; youth-service networks

• Cultural and social awareness

• Student leadership

• Parent participation/involvement of senior citizens

• Special event management

• Crime prevention through environmental design

• Extracurricular activities and recreation

• School/law enforcement partnership

• Screening and selection of staff

• Violence prevention (pre-service and in-service staff training programs)

• School security

• Community service/outreach

• Corporate/business partnerships

• Media relations

• Health service

• Transportation

• Legislative outreach and contact

• Evaluation and monitoring" (p. 19)

Suggested Reading: Safe School Planning

References