FCPS leaders meet to update safety plan

FAYETTE COUNTY, Ky. (WKYT) - Fayette County Public Schools met in a push to promote school safety on Thursday.

They focused on the 10-step plan that was implemented five years ago to make campuses safer.

The District Safety Advisory Committee was created in 2018 following two deadly school shootings. One in Parkland, Florida, and the other in Marshall County, Kentucky.

So much has changed in the country and in Fayette County over the last five years, so the committee is meeting again to update that safety plan. And one of the biggest topics discussed tonight was social media and mental health.

“The preferred platform many times is social media to express the most vulnerable and dangerous things that they face,” said Chief Martin Schafer of the FCPS Police Department.

Chief Shafer helped lead the discussion around the comprehensive 10-step plan. Noting since 2018, the district has added more officers and mental health specialists in each school. Buildings are equipped with more security cameras and metal detectors. The district can monitor social media through Navigate 360, and there is even an anonymous tip line for students and families.

“They can communicate and express threats of harm, threats of danger, in a way that it will be actioned appropriately without exposing the source,” said Chief Shafer.

The District’s Chief Student Support Officer, Deedeh Newbern, says they’re also incorporating social and emotional learning through bi-monthly training for staff.

“With everything that’s happening in the world today, those skills help us to be collaborative, supportive and just overall good people,” said Newbern. “That, to me, is a part of this plan we just can’t leave out.”

There will be two more safety advisory committee meetings this month.

The district will also be sending out surveys for families to complete throughout the month of March. Then they’ll take their updated plan to the school board.

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