Oregon schools getting $3 million in federal dollars for school safety and prevention

Each of Oregon’s 19 regional education service districts will be able to hire a full-time specialist to oversee school safety and prevention programs with new federal funds. 

The specialists, who support mental health and suicide prevention programs and crisis response teams at schools across the state, will be paid with federal Covid relief money distributed by Gov. Kate Brown.

Brown announced on Thursday she would allocate $3.3 million from the $32.5 million available to her in the Governor’s Education Relief Fund for the hiring the school safety specialists. 

In a news release, Brown said the specialists would help education service districts, which provide programs and services for the state’s 196 school districts, build up existing violence prevention programs as well as programs to prevent violence, bullying and harassment, and to promote student mental health.

“Every student in Oregon deserves to be safe from gun violence. Every parent should be able to send their child to school knowing they will come home safe. Every teacher and school employee should be able to go to work without fear for their safety or that of the students under their care,” Brown wrote. 

Currently, only two education service districts have a full-time specialist dedicated to overseeing student safety programs at schools in each region. Nine have a part-time safety official. With the funding, each district will have a full-time specialist, according to Brown’s release. 

The federal Department of Education also announced Thursday that Oregon is eligible for more than $8 million in federal funds from the Bipartisan Safer Communities Act. That bill, which largely focused on gun safety regulations, included ​​a $1 billion allocation to schools for boosting student mental health programs and staff. It was passed in the wake of a school shooting in Uvalde, Texas, where 19 children and two adults were killed.