PSW Program Highlight: The New Crisis Response Program

PublicSchoolWORKS’ new comprehensive Crisis Response Program is a district-specific program designed to ensure that school staff and the facilities where they work, as well as local agencies, are prepared to act in the event of a crisis, whether it be an active shooter, bomb / IED or other crisis event.

The program’s training courses include staff training such as Bomb Threat/IED Preparedness, Emergency Response Procedures and School Lockdown Drills, and two different Active Shooter Response courses — Active Shooter Response - Lockdown, Barricade, Escape and Active Shooter Response - Lockdown, Barricade, Escape, Counter Attack.

The new Active Shooter courses teach employees to identify when it is safest to secure or barricade a classroom, as well as when it is appropriate to hide and/or evacuate in the event of an active shooter situation. The courses also instruct staff how to interact with law enforcement officials so they do not hinder law enforcement efforts.

In addition to this information, the Active Shooter Response - Lockdown, Barricade, Escape, Counter Attack course helps staff understand how to properly flee, and as a last resort, use physical aggression to scare off or surprise and overpower the shooter.

The Crisis Response Program also includes safety tasks that manage the timing of drills and other activities — such as Crisis Response Drills, Ongoing Security Maintenance and Building-specific Tasks — for administrators, as well as the review of plans, procedures and informational forms with staff, parents and local agencies.

And, to engage parents in the process, the Crisis Response Program provides the PublicSchoolWORKS Parent InfoCenter. The Parent InfoCenter gives students, parents and other members of the community access to the Student Bullying & Safety Reporting Systems and national crisis hotlines, as well as providing parents access to student safety information. This allows parents to be just as informed concerning the signs of bullying or other student safety issues.

While training is extremely important to ensuring school safety, effective crisis plans provide both sufficient preventative measures for schools and ample information and communication tools for both parents and students. To learn more about how your district can prepare for school crises with the Crisis Response Program, email sales@publicschoolworks.com.

New Course Highlight: Active Shooter

PublicSchoolWORKS has added two active shooter training courses to its catalog: Active Shooter Response - Lockdown, Barricade, Escape and Active Shooter Response - Lockdown, Barricade, Escape, Counter Attack.

Both courses teach employees to identify when it is safest to secure or barricade a classroom, as well as when it is appropriate to hide and/or evacuate in the event of an active shooter situation. The courses also instruct staff how to interact with law enforcement officials during and after active shooter situations so they do not hinder law enforcement efforts

In addition to this information, the Counter Attack course helps staff understand when it is best to flee in a manner that will save the most lives such as running in a zigzag pattern and spreading out and, as a last resort, using physical aggression to scare off or surprise and overpower the shooter.  To learn more about this course, email sales@publicschoolworks.com.

New Course Highlight: Permissible Use of Seclusion and Restraint

PublicSchoolWORKS has launched the Permissible Use of Seclusion and Restraint course to help districts meet the U.S. Department of Education’s new guidelines.  Designed to address the 15 new guidelines put out by the U.S. DOE, the course trains educators how to appropriately restrain students in the event they become physically harmful to their peers, identify when physical restraint or seclusion is necessary and how to accomplish restraint or seclusion following the 15 new standards. To learn more about these 15 guidelines, click here. To learn more about this course, email sales@publicschoolworks.com.

New Course Highlight: Suicide Prevention (Jason Flatt Act)

As of 2012, The Jason Flatt Act has been implemented in ten states nationwide. The act mandates that educators receive suicide prevention training along with their other annual required in-service courses. The training helps educators identify the warning signs of children contemplating suicide and teaches them how to appropriately handle and report the situation. To find out more about the act and the Jason Foundation, click here. To learn more about this course, email sales@publicschoolworks.com.

PSW Program Highlight: Student Bullying & Violence Prevention Program (SBVPP)

PublicSchoolWORKS’ SBVPP is the only complete program to help school districts support students experiencing bullying, violence and other school safety issues. The program includes a Task Scheduler that auto-manages the timing, notification, tracking and completion of all associated tasks, such as period posting and distribution of anti-bullying posters, periodic or annual distribution of labels and meeting with key internal and external parties to review data.  This ensures schools are in compliance with district, local, state or federal requirements.

Courses are available to train students on violence and bullying concerns and how to report them and to train staff t on how to effectively handle bullying and violence issues. Students can use the provided reporting tools - the Student Bullying Reporting System and Student Safety Reporting System - to anonymously report bullying and violence concerns. The SBVPP also provides schools with informational posters, handouts and stickers for students to remind them to use the resources available to them.

To complete the system, SBVPP also comes with the Parent InfoCenter. The Parent InfoCenter gives parents access to the reporting systems and national crisis hotlines, as well as access to the same bullying training that students and staff receive at school.

Cleveland Independent School District (ISD) began using the SBVPP this year to manage bullying and violence training for staff, as well as the reporting and tracking of bullying and violence incidents. “With all of the duties our district is tasked with on a daily basis, this system gives us the ability to focus more on education and less on tracking down staff and following paper trails,” said Karin Miller, the assistant superintendent of Special Programs at Cleveland ISD.

An effective anti-bullying and anti-violence program includes effective strategies along with reporting mechanisms, training and other tools for staff, students and parents. To learn more about how your district can use the SBVPP, email sales@publicschoolworks.com.

New Training Alert: Active Shooter Response Training (Video for Students)

PublicSchoolWORKS has added a new safety video to its training catalog. The video, Active Shooter Response Training (Video for Students), covers the new active shooter training model ALICE: Alert, Lockdown, Inform, Counter and Evacuate. This new training encourages students and teachers to think strategically and be proactive should a shooting occur. Traditionally, training for active shooter situations had consisted of finding shelter and waiting for authorities to arrive. However, studies have shown that solely using this response may actually increase the number of causalities. 

To learn more about PSW’s Active shooter training or any other courses in PSW’s Staff Training system, email sales@publicschoolworks.com...

One of the major benefits of the PSW Safety Training System is that it will alert staff when training must be completed. Rockwood School District’s Director of Human Resources, Katie Reboulet, uses the system to ensure that her staff members complete their assigned training courses on time and the system automatically notifies her who has not completed training.

“Within one week of the compliance due date, all of our staff had completed their training,” said Reboulet. “The best thing is that we can now easily ensure that our employees have completed the training. The difference between this automated system and our former paper-based one is night and day.”

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Spotlight: School Management for Fire Safety

Last month, Hanover Park High School in East Hanover, NJ experienced an electrical fire. According to the East Hanover- Florham Park Patch, the fire was caused by a faulty heater in the school guidance counselor’s office. The East Hanover Fire Department responded to the activated fire alarm to find that the fire was already put out by a school custodian with a fire extinguisher. Because of this swift action, there was no fire or smoke damage. To read more about the incident, click here.

Ensuring that both staff and students are prepared to act in the event of a fire can save lives. PSW’s Safety Task Management System features an entire library of compliance tasks dedicated to fire & life safety including the inspection of fire extinguishers, exit signs, emergency lights and required drills. The Safety Task Management System automatically alerts the appropriate administrator when safety tasks need to be completed so schools can stay in compliance with federal, state and district mandates. The automatic reminders guarantee that compliance tasks are addressed with little effort.

To find out more about how your district can use the Safety Task Management System for fire safety and other compliance tasks, email sales@publicschoolworks.com.