Texas Governor Greg Abbott announced the rollout of an online school safety system designed to enhance safety and improve emergency communications.
According to the Texas Education Agency (TEA), Sentinel is a centralized information hub that collects and processes critical safety data that can be shared with schools. It features statewide programs for uploading data from behavioral threat assessments and vulnerability assessments, allowing for a uniform approach for identifying, assessing, and mitigating risks to students and staff, Fox San Antonio reports.
“As a state, everyone was doing things differently, there wasn’t one way of doing it,” said John Scott, TEA’s chief of school safety and security. “Sentinel is a one-stop shop for everything school safety.”
The system also houses training resources and offers mass communication capabilities to quickly disseminate information during local and state emergencies.
Scott said the TEA met with 30 superintendents from across the state to discuss leading safety and security practices and what should be included in the system.
“TEA’s Office of School Safety and Security continues to search for ways to better support the 1,200 school systems in Texas and their efforts in keeping students and staff safe,” he said. “I really think that Sentinel is going to go a long way to professionalizing school safety across the state of Texas. Maybe the superintendent has some information. Maybe the maintenance folks have some. Maybe the principal has some.”
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The system was developed following the passage of House Bill 3, a $300 million bill passed last year to improve state monitoring of school safety and increase per-pupil school safety allotments. Also passed last year was Senate Bill 30, which provides an additional $1.1 billion for school safety enhancements. It covers improved physical safety features, an armed security guard at each school, and the state’s regular site assessments. Scott said Sentinel will help keep track of data obtained during those assessments, such as required door handle checks and intruder detection audits.
Local districts have been preparing for the release of the system, which officially launched on July 24. The San Antonio Independent School District held a School Safety and Security Committee meeting last week to discuss the system and its features.
TEA’s Office of School Safety and Security hosted a webinar for school staff on July 31 to provide additional details about the system and its implementation.
