Workgroup Leaders:

Andrea Coleman, Community Leader
Nina McCormack, Facilitator
Lisa Deffendall, Project Coordinator
Ellen Whitley, Staff Leader

Why Consider School Safety and Alternative Placements?

• Research shows that in schools with a positive and welcoming climate, students are more likely to succeed academically and less likely to engage in high risk behaviors.
• The study of school safety helps us to understand and address its various dimensions and components, including the general atmosphere or spirit of the school, the traits students and school staff bring to the campus, the organizational and interpersonal processes that occur in and around the school, and the physical conditions in which education takes place.
• Helping our students achieve at the highest levels involves the use of effective student disciplinary procedures, which must include proactive prevention strategies for all students and staff, targeted interventions for some students, and intensive strategies for the 1 percent to 7 percent of the students who continue to have chronic problems with disruptive, destructive, or violent behaviors in school.
• Suspension, expulsion, retention, chronic failure, and alienation contribute to unacceptable dropout and incompletion rates.
• A safe school is equipped to respond in emergency situations and provides for the both the physical and emotional safety of students and staff.
• A segment of our student population is not well-served by our existing academic offerings and school structures.