FUNDING SUMMARY
The latest act passed by Michigan Legislature, Senate Bill No. 173, Public Act 103 of 2023, Section 31aa, or MDE 31aa, allocates per-pupil funding for the 2022-2023 school year to improve student mental health and safety. Under the act, Michigan schools are eligible for funding to implement a secure platform for school officials, emergency responders, and emergency management coordinators to house all school safety-related items, including emergency operations plan (EOP) templates, EOP guidance, reference documents, and security assessments. Recipients must also plan to use at least 50% of funds awarded on activities related to improving student mental health.
Applications for grant funding may be submitted on your NexSys Dashboard and will remain open until 11:59 p.m. on Sunday, December 10, 2023.
Michigan House Bill No. 6012 Part 97d is a bipartisan bill that makes a historic investment in school safety by fully funding risk assessments and critical incident mapping to help protect students and create safety plans in the event of an emergency.
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Michigan House Bill No. 6012 Part 97d Parameters
Critical incident mapping with StrataSite™ yields, in-part, a map that meets the following key grant qualification parameters, as detailed in the final version of the bill, excerpted below:
- It must be compatible with platforms and applications used by local, state, and federal public safety officials.
- It must not require the purchase of additional software for use.
- It must be provided in a printable format.
- It must be verified for accuracy through a walk-through of a school building and school grounds
- It must be oriented true north.
- It must include accurate floor plans overlaid on or current aerial imagery of a school building or school plan.
- It must include site-specific labeling that matches the structure of the school building, including room labels, hallway names, external door or stairwell numbers, locations of hazards, key utility locations, key boxes, automated external defibrillators, and trauma kits.
- It must include site-specific labeling that matches the school grounds, including parking areas, athletic fields, surrounding roads, and neighboring properties.
- It must include a gridded overlay with x/y coordinates
- It must include information that best assists first responders in an emergency, including, but not limited to, the following information: (i) Building numbers. (ii) Floors. (iii) Suite designations. (iv) Room numbers. (v) Other available relevant location information for each school
Senate Bill No. 173, Public Act 103 of 2023, Section 31aa / MDE 31aa Parameters
Allowable expenditures under this program include:
- Hiring or contracting for support staff for student mental health needs, including, but not limited to, school psychologists, social workers, counselors, and school nurses.
- Purchasing and implementing mental health screening tools.
- Providing school-based mental health personnel access to consultation with behavioral health clinicians to respond to complex student mental health needs.
- Any other mental health service or product necessary to improve or maintain the mental health of students and staff.
- Coordination with local law enforcement.
- Training for school staff on threat assessment.
- Training for school staff and students on threat response.
- Training for school staff on crisis communication.
- Safety infrastructure, including, but not limited to, cameras, door blocks, hardened vestibules, window screening, and technology necessary to operate buzzer systems. This may also include firearm detection software that integrates to existing security cameras to detect and alert school personnel and first responders to visible firearms on school property. The software described in the immediately preceding sentence must be organically developed and proprietary to the company it is purchased from and should not include any third-party or open-source data.
- Age-appropriate training for students and families on responsible gun ownership.
- School resource officers.
- Any other school safety service or product necessary to improve or maintain security in buildings.
- Student Safety Management System, the information technology platform and related services to improve student safety by mitigating cyberbullying, school violence, human trafficking, and self-harm that supports students from grades K to 12.
- A secure platform, administered by the department of state police, for school officials, emergency responders, and emergency management coordinators to house all school safety-related items, including, but not limited to, EOP templates, EOP guidance, reference documents, and security assessments. The platform should use existing password-protected access control methods schools currently utilize and, to the extent possible, be capable of integrating with existing platforms or technologies used by districts for school safety. Through permissions-based access control, the platform should be able to relay information clearly and in real time to each person or entity necessary to provide a unified response to a safety incident, or to take appropriate action in response to an anticipated disruption to the normal functions of the surrounding community.
Critical Incident Mapping with StrataSite™ for Michigan School Districts
How Schools are Preparing for the Threat of Emergency SituationsAdditional School Safety and Security Funding Opportunities
Stronger Connections Grant
Michigan was awarded $27,000,000 for the Stronger Connections Grant Program (SCG), a program of the Bipartisan Safety Communities Act (BSC) which provides historic funding to support schools in establishing safe learning environments.
BJA STOP School Violence Program
The Bureau of Justice Assistance (BJA) STOP School Violence Program provides funding for initiatives to prevent violence in a K-12 school setting, to further the DOJ’s mission by supporting and assisting county, local, territorial, and tribal jurisdictions in improving efforts to reduce violent crime in and around schools.
COPS School Violence Prevention Program
The COPS Office School Violence Prevention Program (SVPP) provides funding directly to states, units of local government, Indian tribes, and their public agencies to improve security at schools and on school grounds in the recipient’s jurisdiction through evidence-based school safety programs and technology for coordinated emergency response.
Competitive School Safety Grant Program (CSSGP)
The CSSGP provides state funding to improve the safety and security of students, staff, and school buildings through the purchase of technology and equipment or to upgrade hardening measures.