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Chicomm Blog

How to Earn School Safety Grants

Posted by Lisa MacGillivray on Thursday, January 21, 2016

School and student safety has perhaps never been under more public scrutiny. School administrators and parents want to do everything in their power to ensure safety in the face of tragic events like school shootings and natural disasters.

Fortunately, technology exists to help protect schools and their students, faculty, and staff. But school districts have limited budgets and are often at a loss when it come to accessing that technology. The good news is that there are options and resources in place to help schools get the equipment and services that they need. One of the most common ways to do so is through school safety grants.

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School safety grants are awarded to schools (or school districts) to help offset, or even cover, the cost of purchasing emergency communications equipment. Devices like digital two-way radios are valuable pieces to the school safety puzzle, and grants like these help put them in the hands of those who need them most.

Whether you're applying for your first school safety grant, have received one in the past, or have been denied a grant and want to increase your chances of success this time, here are three things to consider when applying:

1. Clearly identify the problem.

While school shootings and natural disasters receive the most public and media attention, and having an emergency plan for events like these is critical, it is far more common for campuses to experience a playground or sporting injury or a lockdown resulting from a neighborhood incident. Make sure the safety needs of your particular school are accurately described so that the grantor can evaluate what you need and whether they can help you address that need.

When applying for grants, schools need to clearly identify the challenges they face, and why it is important to overcome them. In many cases, this can consist of stating that your school is underprepared for an active shooter situation or a tornado, but you should always expand on the different ways an emergency can impact the safety of your students, including the more common scenarios you may have faced in the past, and the negative consequences of those scenarios.

2. Analyze current and needed resources.

Understand what your current resources are, and compare those to where you need to be to effectively solve the problems you've articulated.

For example, does your staff currently rely on their personal cell phones in an emergency situation? If so, you can research and describe the different ways in which digital two-way radios would be a better option. The goal is to note what devices or resources you currently have, what devices and resources you need to solve your problems, and how you plan on using the grant support to bridge that gap.

3. Bridge the gap with an action plan.

Create a detailed strategy for how you will use the grant, especially when it comes to school safety. Have ideas in place for the types of equipment you would like to purchase, from which company, and when you plan on having those pieces in place. In addition to that, consider how your staff will be trained to use the devices, and the timeline for that process as well.

4. Get assistance from trusted experts.

Motorola offers a program to assist schools in applying for school safety grants. In addition, a qualified communications provider can provide much of the information and many of the budget figures you'll need for your grant application.

If you’d like to learn more about what types of equipment are best for school safety, and how much those devices cost, contact Chicago Communications today

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