From NewsChannel 9: How much money is your child's school district getting to help keep their schools safe? Through our sister statio
From NewsChannel 9: How much money is your child’s school district getting to help keep their schools safe?
Through our sister station FOX 17 in Nashville, we’re getting an exclusive look at where Governor Bill Lee’s nearly $200 million in school safety grant money is going. The state legislature approved the funding just months after the tragedy at The Covenant School.
Schools across the state have been applying for the funds since the end of June.
All public schools and private schools are eligible to apply for two grants.
One is aimed at putting an armed school resource officer in each public school building. The money from that helped the Hamilton County Sheriff’s Office fully staff all 32 School Resource Deputy positions in Hamilton County Schools for the first time in years.
The second grant provides widely physical safety upgrades for school buildings (i.e. bullet-resistant film for windows, cameras, weapons detectors, door locks, better lighting, etc.).
This money can also be used for programs like staff training, conflict resolution, and violence prevention.
First, schools must submit a detailed emergency operations plan to the Tennessee Department of Education and the Tennessee Department of Safety and Homeland Security.
School officials must outline how they’ll navigate a crisis, and what safety features they wish to request.
So far, Tennessee’s Department of Education has gotten more than 1,700 operations plans from schools.
Here’s a list of pending grant awards for each school district in our viewing area. This is all pending final approval of their application and safety plans:
- Athens City Schools: $68,197.96
- Bledsoe County Schools: $64,120.80
- Bradley County Schools: $411,224.95
- Cleveland City Schools: $231,205.22
- Dayton City Schools: $32,562.25
- Hamilton County Schools: $1,763,005.27
- Marion County Schools: $157,016.54
- McMinn County Schools: $204,416.51
- Meigs County Schools: $69,834.70
- Polk County Schools: $83,760.09
- Rhea County Schools: $163,249.32
- Sequatchie County Schools: $80,477.34
Read the full list of school districts and how much they’re getting below:
As of August 14th, 27 public and charter school applications have been approved by TDOE for the Public School Security Grant.
Some 370 private schools have applied for funding, as well. The Covenant School would fall into that category. Those applications are still being accepted.
Many of the details on exactly what this money will pay for in each specific school is under tight wraps for security reasons, not open to public information or document requests.
However, some school districts, like Metro Nashville Public Schools and Sumner County Public Schools have already announced publicly they’ll be getting bullet resistant film.
