A response to increase school violence: Development of Florida's Statewide School Safety Hotline

This was a doctoral study that developed an early warning system to address potential violence in all elementary, middle and high schools. The Florida Sheriffs' Association Statewide School Safety Hotline was developed and designed so that students, parents, teachers and school staff would have a way to report potential crimes and acts of violence by telephone without the fear of losing their anonymity.; The Florida Legislature through the Department of Education contracted with the Florida Sheriffs' Association to develop the hotline. The Florida Sheriffs' Association is a non-profit organization that is comprised of the 67 sheriffs and operates a statewide task force.; The hotline was piloted between March 1993 to March 2000 in all public and private elementary, middle and high schools within two Florida counties. The Florida Sheriffs Association planned, coordinated and implemented the hotline by facilitating meetings of the local school boards, municipal law enforcement agencies and sheriffs in the pilot counties.; The project demonstrated several minor weaknesses in its design. First, there was an inconsistency in the interpretation of data by those who read the hotline reports and entered that information in specific categories for evaluation. Second, there was a lack of hotline information captured on the spreadsheets to properly identify the specific categories of criminal activity. Third, due to promotions, demotions, retirements, resignations or transfers, the contact person for each participating hotline organization frequently changed.; Overall the project produced successful results that clearly identified that the hotline was being utilized to provide information that could be critical to saving lives and creating a safe school environment.; At the conclusion of the pilot project, the 2000 Florida Legislature continued the funding to expand this program statewide into the remaining 65 counties.