PHOENIX — Superintendent of Public Instruction Tom Horne’s School Safety Task Force has released recommendations to enhance security measures in Arizona schools.
The group consisting of educators, legislators, mental health professionals and law enforcement held their final meeting Thursday to offer recommendations to improve school safety, some including making changes to state laws.
“The safety of our schools is of the utmost importance. There is no greater nightmare than to contemplate a maniac shooting up a school and it’s essential that everything is done to increase campus safety," Superintendent Horne said. "This committee has done remarkable work and now the task is to get these proposed changes implemented so we can make the state’s school safety program even stronger.”
Allowing retired law enforcement to serve as school resource officers
One proposed change to state law would allow retired law enforcement officers to works as school resources officers. The group said this will help fill SRO positions "in an era of chronic shortage of law enforcement officers."
138 schools have been granted funds for an SRO but are unable to find suitable candidates, according to the task force.
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"Statutes governing retirement and reemployment have been identified as barriers to allowing retirees to reengage their service as SROs," the task force said.
Funding for school safety officers
SROs are assigned to a specific campus. A school safety officer, however, is not assigned to a specific campus which means more than one school safety officer is required to cover a school full time. That's where the next recommendation comes in: allowing the school safety program to pay for SSOs and school psychologists to complement positions that are already on campus.
The Arizona Department of Education's School Safety Program currently supports the costs of SROs, juvenile probation officers, school counselors and school social workers but not school psychologists or school safety officers.
Increase mental health training
Another proposed change to state law would add increased mental health training to focus on adolescent mental health issues for school safety grant recipients. The task force wants to add to Arizona Revised Statue 15-154 a plan to train school resource officers or juvenile probation officers in FERPA, civil rights and adolescent mental health issues.
The task force also wants to add a mental health professional manual that incorporates a multi-disciplinary safety approach.
Recommendations that don't involve changing state laws
Added responsibilities for the Department of Education that require no changes to state law include reviewing and providing additional safety training and materials, hosting an annual conference for educators, law enforcement and mental health professionals and pursuing partnerships with entities that can help encourage workforce development in the social work and mental health sectors.
