The state of student safety

District administrators are under immense pressure from parents to keep their children safe and are investing money in school safety initiatives. Communities have shifted from the belief that “it can’t happen here,” to doing everything they can to prevent it from happening.

Twenty years ago, the concerns about student safety were about preventing classroom misbehavior, physical bullying, fighting, and drugs. Now, it’s much more complex and the stakes are higher. We are literally talking about life and death issues for our students. What has changed in recent years to explain this increase in personal self-harm, suicide, and school violence?

Related content: 6 reasons we’re using a student safety platform…Read More

Districts are using tech to prevent school violence

School violence regularly occupies news headlines, turning students into activists as they demand gun control and call on lawmakers and education stakeholders to drastically improve school safety.

This disturbing trend, including the Feb. 14, 2018 shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Fla., and the Nov. 14 shooting at Saugus High School in Santa Clarita, Calif., has prompted many districts to turn to technology solutions to put an extra layer of safety measures in schools.

Tools that monitor social media for threats, anonymous reporting systems, and databases to track and identify potentially preventable patterns among shootings are growing in popularity as educators recognize the importance of technology in preventing school violence.…Read More

Learn how school districts gain spending transparency and boost morale

School districts face urgent issues, from student safety to teacher evaluations, but perhaps the most critical problem involves mismanaged spending. Mismanaged spending can be a costly, potentially criminal, liability.

For example, an audit of 42 school districts in Pennsylvania found incorrect payments of more than $8.4 million in transportation expenses.

But the problem goes beyond just wasted funds. Mismanaged spending can also lead to:
• Squandered resources
• Overworked personnel
• Extra time needed to untangle invoices and missing paperwork
• Non-compliance with AP protocols or school guidelines…Read More

How we created a comprehensive drone curriculum

As educators, we are all continuously looking for interdisciplinary learning opportunities that will provide students with the most authentic learning experiences possible. With students’ hyper-exposure to the growing applications for technology, STEAM programs are one area in which real-world applications are readily apparent to students.

Here in Salamanca, New York, as we seek to ensure our students have the necessary marketable skills for the modern economy, we’ve chosen to incorporate a drone curriculum into our STEAM programs. With the core drone skills, our students open themselves to employment opportunities in diverse sectors such as cinematography, industrial inspections, public safety, agriculture, construction, specialized sciences, and much more.

Drone education starts early on

To deliver on this goal for our students, we have developed a comprehensive drone curriculum that will introduce students to drones as early as kindergarten and allow them to become more hands-on throughout their academic career. For juniors and seniors, that experience culminates with an immersive curriculum through which they become FAA-certified drone pilots, while also imparting the core skills in data collection analysis necessary to pursue careers in this rapidly evolving workforce.…Read More

5 new developments in physical and network safety

As technology improves, so do solutions to keep students and teachers safe in school buildings and on school networks. This is the main reason why school safety, including cybersecurity and physical safety, retains its place as a top concern for education leaders.

Balancing access to educational resources with security needs remains a top challenge for school district IT leaders, according to new findings from the Speak Up Research Project for Digital Learning.

Seventy-one percent of district administrators and IT leaders are concerned about the security of their network against malicious attacks or misbehavior, as outlined in the data, which comes from a collaboration between the nonprofit Project Tomorrow and cloud security provider iboss.…Read More

96 edtech predictions for K12 in 2019

We asked 49 edtech executives to look into their crystal balls and share their thoughts about what will happen in 2019. In addition to the usual suspects—more augmented reality (AR) and virtual reality (VR) apps—a lot of people believe this will be the year that social emotional learning (SEL) and interoperability become part of the mainstream. There are also a lot of predictions about improving safety and security. Read on to see what’s in store for 2019…

Berj Akian, CEO, ClassLink

• With 2019 here and 2020 in arm’s reach, there’s an ever-growing expectation that next-generation tech tools should do a better job of informing educators on which resources improve learning outcomes. I’m pleased to say that more and more education leaders and technology products providers are regularly talking and doing something about this. I hope this topic always remains the main problem to solve, and that the slow, steady progress the industry is making continues.…Read More

Resources for creating a school culture of empathy, inclusion, and kindness

Since the mass shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida, we’ve heard from many educators who are looking for resources to support students’ social and emotional development. To help, we’ve collected our best social and emotional learning (SEL) resources for building a culture of safety, kindness, and upstanding in your school.

SEL Educator Toolkit
SEL skills aren’t core content, but they’re at the core of all content. Find lessons, activities, classroom tools, and family resources to help students learn about character strengths and develop empathy, compassion, integrity, and more.

Digital Citizenship and SEL
A key aspect of digital citizenship is thinking critically when faced with digital dilemmas. Navigating these challenges isn’t only about rules and procedures; it’s about character. Help students examine challenging online situations with this discussion guide.…Read More

6 tools to support school safety efforts

As teachers and students return to school across the country, thoughts range from nervous excitement to worries about how to keep school buildings–and the people in them–secure.

Last year’s school shooting in Parkland, FL sparked a massive movement, including student lie-ins and protests, focused on gun control and the irrefutable point that students should not have to worry about injuries or death when walking in school hallways or sitting in classrooms.

As students at Parkland’s Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School pointed out, they aren’t the site of the first school shooting, and unfortunately, they didn’t expect to be the last. In fact, shortly after the Parkland shooting, another school shooting occurred in St. Mary’s County, MD. And earlier this month, a male high school student in Oklahoma stabbed a female classmate, allegedly because she declined to go out on a date with him despite his repeated efforts.…Read More

SEL should be an easy sell for U.S. schools and districts

In light of tragic events that have put a spotlight on school safety issues, it’s more important than ever to understand the value of students’ social and emotional learning (SEL). While many districts have started conversations about SEL and its correlation to student success, it’s time to start acting.

The majority of students face daunting socioeconomic and emotional pressures. An alarmingly high number of students experience trauma at home, and their attitudes towards learning can vary due to these outside factors. In fact, studies show that up to 60 percent of all high school students are “chronically disengaged” from their own learning.

Our constantly evolving digital world is another factor that plays into student achievement. Cyberbullying has become more and more common, and a remarkable 20 percent of middle school students reported seriously contemplating suicide in a survey conducted by the Cyberbullying Research Center. Although these statistics are frightening, districts are finding ways to implement support into curriculum to avoid these and other tragedies.…Read More

Can we design learning environments geared for maximum motivation?

What can we learn from human psychology about designing learning environments geared for maximum motivation?

Let’s start by identifying core human motivations using Maslow’s Hierarchy of Human Needs. Psychologist Abraham Maslow studied human motivation as a whole, rather than the discrete pockets of motivation prior studies had identified. Maslow’s Hierarchy is depicted as a pyramid, with the base of the structure housing the most basic needs and more rigorous needs building on top of those. Maslow referred to the first four levels of the hierarchy as deficiency needs, which is to say each lower-level need must be met before moving on to the next level. Should any lower-level need become deficient in the future, people will work to correct the deficiency before moving forward.

All this motivation builds toward the tip of the pyramid: self-actualization. This may seem like a stretch for students, given that most adults spend their lives striving toward this lofty goal. When we build a safe, motivating place for students to turn their focus inward, they’re free to pursue the beginning of self-actualization. How’s that for whole-child education?…Read More

Weak cell service? How schools can solve this still-pervasive problem

Today’s students are more connected to their devices than ever before, whether they’re using their tablets or cellular devices to take notes in class, conduct research, or write a report. As such, strong cellular connectivity has become a must for schools and universities. Faculty and students rely upon secure wireless data and mobile coverage in order to teach, learn, and grow together. Having good cellular service also enhances safety on school grounds, keeping staff connected in emergency scenarios in which an instructor or staff member is not near a landline telephone and must instead place a cellular call for immediate assistance.

Unfortunately, due to the nature of cellular signals, schools can’t always provide consistently strong cellular signal for students, faculty, and staff. Accessing a strong indoor signal can be difficult depending on campus size and location, the distance to the nearest cell tower, or natural obstructions such as mountains and district budgets.

Construction materials can also cause issues with cellular signal. Modern schools and universities are usually a combination of older buildings and newer, environmentally friendly construction. Both styles can interfere with radio frequency waves coming from the nearest cell tower. What’s more, the many hundreds of students and teachers in the buildings can easily overload a weak network.…Read More