Lethal and non-lethal violent acts on school property are becoming more and more common, ranging from the most horrific shooting events to schoolyard fights. In this post, we will describe school threat assessment and the challenges associated with school safety. Also included are resources on critical topics. Lastly, we describe how active threat assessment and situational awareness training can help school personnel prevent violence.

Are there training programs that focus on proactive safety and threat recognition for law enforcement and security professionals? We built our training around a structured, four-step observation process, not intuition or guesswork, that equips law enforcement, security, and safety professionals to recognize meaningful behavioral deviations and make defensible decisions before situations escalate.

There are a number of training approaches recommended to heal police-community tensions, including procedural justice, implicit bias, de-escalation, and CIT. These approaches involve assessment, decision-making, and communication. In the second of this two-part series, we focus on de-escalation and crisis intervention training.

There are a number of training approaches recommended to heal police-community tensions, including procedural justice, implicit bias, de-escalation, and CIT. These approaches involve assessment, decision-making, and communication. In the first of this two-part series, we focus on procedural justice and implicit bias training.

In this interview on the Managing Violence podcast, Joe Saunders and Nathan Meehan discuss the origin of active threat assessment, systematic observation, and ways of identifying potential threats.

Check out a podcast interview with Second Sight’s Director of R&D about the application of research to practice and our new Situational Awareness for Safety Program.

Trainees telling you they feel more prepared is one thing. Real evidence they actually are is another. We break down our training evaluation across three levels, what personnel report, what they demonstrably learn, and how it holds up in the field, including a documented case of a trainee applying it successfully months after training.

Online training is not a panacea. It is not a replacement for instructor-led training. But there are distinct benefits, and downsides, to each type of training delivery.

Experience matters especially when dealing with stressful situations. Stress inoculation training is an approach that involves exposing trainees to gradually more stressful situations, allowing them to better handle hazardous or dangerous events or people they may face while on duty.

The tenants of instructional design can help you develop more efficient and effective training.

Learn about the origin of active threat assessment for law enforcement through the Just Doesn’t Look Right Project and the Identifying Threats Training Program.

Every profession develops its own shorthand, and structured observation is no different. We break down why a shared, trained vocabulary matters for law enforcement and security professionals communicating what they observe, in real time and in reports, and why it becomes even more essential on teams built from mixed backgrounds like law enforcement, corrections, and military.