STOP School Violence Prevention Grant program for the Consortium of rural school districts in Mississippi

The Child Evangelism Fellowship, Greater Jackson Chapter (CEF) is the lead applicant for a consortium of three rural school districts in Mississippi with eighteen (18) schools serving 7,644 students in grades K-12. As the lead agency, CEF will work closely with all participating schools to implement our Rural Mississippi Safety Consortium (RMSC), The Consortium serves one K-4, five K-5, three K-8, four middle schools, and five high schools.

The Consortium serves a diverse, high-needs population at 18 school sites: 71% are African American, 21% White, 7% Hispanic, and 1% of mixed-race. RMSC schools have a significant need for STOP grant due to high rates of poverty and crime and few protective factors in our community.

Our request is aligned with three purpose areas: 1) Developing and implementing multi-disciplinary behavioral threat assessment teams (BTA) which will conduct evaluations that track data pertaining to the use of BTA, the demographic characteristics of those who undergo assessments and the referral results of those assessments; 2) Training school personnel and educating students on preventing school violence; and 3) Conducting specialized training for law enforcement who work in schools and with school-age population. Programs, training, and activities to support our goals are evidence-based, comprehensive, and designed to meet the individual needs of our staff, students, and community. Our application includes resumes for key personnel, a timeline, and a Memorandum of Understanding with our partners in law enforcement. Our overarching objective is to improve security at the eighteen (18) schools by providing students and teachers with the tools they need to recognize, respond quickly to, and help prevent acts of violence and ensure a positive school climate. The related goals, objectives and specific outcomes are included in the narrative section of our application. Child Evangelism Fellowship has designed a management plan to achieve all the objectives of the proposed program on time and within budget, including clearly defined responsibilities of staff, community partners, and contracted service providers.