Ensuring that education on warning signs and reporting pathways is widely accessible provides another way to disrupt violence. It is not always the traditional stakeholders who will encounter the warning signs, making it important to expand community education on what to look for and where to report a concern.

In this episode of The Sound Off on School Safety, Michele Gay is joined by Dr. Kate Rahi, Associate Director of Projects and Training at Safe and Sound Schools, to examine how schools can move from a reactive approach to a proactive one by building systems designed to identify concerns, assess risk, and provide meaningful support before a situation escalates.

While schools are often trained to screen and handle warning signs, disclosures, and concerning behavior, it is important to remember that these things can surface in any environment. Faith-based organizations, workplaces, community centers, and other places throughout the community have trusted adults that can play a critical role in helping prevent violence before it occurs.

Mental Health professionals play an important role in violence prevention and early intervention. As trusted individuals in schools and communities, they are often in positions where students may disclose emotional struggles, concerning thoughts, grievances or plans that otherwise would go undiscovered.

The following case highlights the importance of a safe reporting culture in identifying these students and the critical role School Resource Officers play in preventing harm and disrupting further escalation along the pathway to violence.

The following case highlights the important role behavioral threat assessment teams have in uncovering risks and preventing violence before it occurs.

Leakage in plans, especially to another peer, is a common theme seen in the cases housed in the Averted School Violence Database. The following case illustrates how student voice can spark early prevention efforts and how thorough Behavioral Threat Assessment & Management creates the conditions for student success.

The ASV database provides invaluable data for educators, law enforcement, and others connected to school communities who seek to identify policies and practices that are proven to prevent violence.

The ASV database provides invaluable data for educators, law enforcement, and others connected to school communities who seek to identify policies and practices that are proven to prevent violence.

The ASV Project aims to serve as a vital resource for school safety planning teams and SROs. Its database features accounts of both completed and averted violence, because lessons can be learned from both acts of violence that were carried out and those that were prevented. Every averted attack represents not only a success story, but a learning opportunity.