WATERVILLE, Maine (WABI) – Parents should inquire does the school has a Behavioral threat assessment program in place?
Just this week there have been multiple threats at Maine schools including Scarborough High School which was evacuated Wednesday after authorities say a suspicious message was found in the bathroom.
That incident comes just one day after MDI High School went under lock down when school administrators received what they call a credible and serious threat.
Jonathan Shapiro, Director of Maine School Safety Center says they take every threat seriously.
“We train schools on how they can determine whether a threat is a subsidize threat meaning that there is some real risk to it, or its a transitory threat, meaning it is just a youthful person, making a spontaneous statement with no intent or danger behind it,” Shapiro said.
Using an evidence-based protocol, Shapiro said they have trained over 600 staff members and are on track to train over 2000.
“It is very scripted, and it has been thoroughly vetted and what we are training schools is that they develop a multi-disciplinary team, and they analyze a threat.
He said the vast majority of threats fall on the low end of being a transitory threat and should be dealt with accordingly.
“Treating a threat too severely is problematic is it is not warranted and not treating it severely enough if it is warranted is a problem,” he said.
Shapiro said they focus on a prevention model because a response model would be after the fact.
“We know what works for prevention. We know that students should have at least one caring adult trusted adult that they can do to and talk to,” he said.
This voluntary training opportunity is available to schools at no cost, and currently, there is a waiting list of staff members interested.
“Our general goal would be that each district at least one team but eventually we would like each school building, each school within a district to have their own team,” Shapiro said.
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