The School Safety Working Group (SSWG), organized under SB20-023 and HB22-1274, completed their legislatively mandated work in 2023.  A collaboration of the state agencies that provide resources to schools, the group was tasked with:

• Studying and implementing feedback of the state auditor’s report regarding school safety released in September 2019;
• Considering program organization and recommending reorganization if necessary;
• Identifying shared metrics to examine program effectiveness;
• Facilitating interagency coordination and communication;
• Increasing transparency and accessibility of state grants and resources, particularly for school districts without a grant writer, which includes improving outreach and may include developing common grant applications;
• Facilitating and addressing data sharing, including allowable data sharing at the local level, when appropriate and allowable under state and federal law; and
• Addressing school safety program challenges in a coordinated way.

The final report of this stage of the work can be found here and additional information about the work is available on the Colorado Office of School Safety Website.

Confluence Policy & Strategy Group will continue to convene and facilitate the SSWG in collaboration with the Office of School Safety and the Colorado Department of Education into 2024 to see through many of the recommendations found in the report and to build on the work underway.

Confluence Policy and Strategy Group also convenes the Colorado Safer Schools Initiative (CSSI) in partnership with the Public Education and Business coalition (PEBC). CSSI is one of the largest coalitions of education stakeholders in Colorado. A group of more than 250 people have been meeting since April of 2023 to discuss and make recommendations addressing the full scope of issues affecting student and educator safety and well-being.