Pasadena Unified School District's STOP School Violence Grant Program

Pasadena Unified School District (PUSD) operates in a 76-square-mile area and includes 23 schools and serves students within the cities of Pasadena, Sierra Madre and Altadena in a diverse, urban community located 10 miles northeast of downtown Los Angeles, California. Frequently perceived as the prosperous community seen in images of the Rose Parade on New Year’s Day, its public school district serves a population struggling with poverty, crime, and school drop-out. The enrollment for the 2023-24 school year was 14,020. Our community partners for our STOP grant program include the Pasadena Police Department, Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department, and Los Angeles County Departments of Mental Health. In conjunction with these partners, PUSD seeks funding from the Bureau of Justice Assistance’s STOP School Violence Program grant, Category 2, designed to improve K-12 school safety and ensure a positive school climate for all PUSD school sites. Project activities include: the development and installation of technology solutions to increase communication and intelligence between schools and first responders; enhancement of the behavioral threat assessments and multidisciplinary intervention teams; training for school personnel; and hiring a Safety Liaison to support the prevention of school violence. Beneficiaries of services include PUSD personnel, students, parents and guardians, first responders and the community-at-large. Contractual activities include: evaluation to measure the impact of the project, collection of data – including all data points required for the behavioral threat assessments and protecting privacy and preventing discrimination and bias; a comprehensive training program to recognize, prevent, mitigate, respond to and recover from violence; technical assistance in creating policies and protocols related to threat assessments that are compliant with local, state and federal statutes; and behavioral threat assessment training and technical assistance for multidisciplinary threat assessment teams. Expected outcomes include: an increase in ability to respond to threats on or around school campuses; increased collaboration of PUSD and community partners to operate a multidisciplinary threat assessment team; reduction in disruptive and violent incidents at school; and an increase in sense of safety and school climate. PUSD is seeking consideration under Priority 1A and 1B. Our proposed STOP project meaningfully addresses the identified inequities (included in the narrative) and contributes to greater access to services and opportunities for our community (cities of Pasadena, Altadena, and Sierra Madre) that has been historically underserved, marginalized, adversely affected by inequality, and disproportionately impacted by crime, violence, and victimization.