UNITED STATES DEPARTMENT OF EDUCATION

WASHINGTON, D.C. 20202

April 21, 2000

Dear Principals, Teachers, Mental Health Professionals, and Families:

In 1998, at the request of President Clinton, the U.S. Department of Education and the Department of Justice produced Early Warning, Timely Response: A Guide to Safe Schools (the Early Warning Guide) to help communities make schools even safer in the future than they are today. The Early Warning Guide was designed to provide research-based, practical help needed to "keep every child in your school out of harm's way."

We are pleased by the positive feedback on the Early Warning Guide and by the many schools already implementing recommendations included in the guide. Since releasing the Early Warning Guide, we have received numerous requests for a follow-up resource that provides additional information about the "how to" of developing school safety plans. In response, we have developed Safeguarding Our Children: An Action Guide. The Action Guide provides practical steps schools can take to design and implement school safety plans to reduce violence in our schools and help children get access to the services they need. It stresses the importance of a three-stage, comprehensive model that includes prevention, early intervention, and intensive services to address school safety issues. The guide also emphasizes the importance of strategic planning, capacity building, comprehensive approaches, teamwork, and community involvement in successful schools.

The strategies presented in the Action Guide are based on research that has demonstrated the value of prevention and of comprehensive approaches to school safety that involve the entire education community--principals, teachers, counselors, parents, and students. We hope that you will find the examples of programs and practices provided throughout this Action Guide useful as you examine the needs of your school and community. However, we caution you that using this guide in a cursory way to stigmatize children will be counterproductive and harmful.

We are grateful to the many experts, agencies, and associations in education, law enforcement, juvenile justice, mental health, and other social services that reviewed drafts, provided examples and otherwise contributed to the quality of this publication. We hope that your school and community will benefit from the information provided in the Action Guide.

Sincerely,

Richard W. Riley

Secretary of Education

Janet Reno

Attorney General

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