The Cayuga County Sheriff's Office is rolling out a digital threat assessment tool to seven of the county's eight school districts, using state grant money to make the software available to those districts at no cost.
Sheriff Brian Schenck announced the initiative Wednesday in a release that says trained school staff and school resource officers will use the tool to assess students who may be at risk of harming themselves or others. The teams are expected to determine the level of concern and develop a plan for managing it.
The software, provided by CLPS, digitizes the Harm Prevention Threat Management framework, also called the Florida Model. The Sheriff's Office described it as a consistent process for identifying concerning behavior, assessing potential threats and planning an intervention before violence occurs.
Schenck said school safety depends on cooperation between districts and law enforcement. He said the tool is intended to help teams recognize warning signs earlier and develop appropriate support plans for students while protecting school communities.
State grant covers seven districts
The New York State Division of Homeland Security and Emergency Services paid for the seven-district initiative through a Domestic Terrorism Prevention Grant, according to the release. Auburn City School District, the county's eighth district, had already budgeted money for the software separately.
The release did not identify the seven participating districts, give the grant amount or specify when each district's team will begin using the software. It also did not describe how students or families would be notified when a student is assessed.
Model follows Florida school safety changes
The Sheriff's Office said the framework was developed after the 2018 shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida. Florida began requiring its public schools to use the state's harm prevention and threat management model in January 2024.
John McNelis, CLPS's senior director of risk management, said the company will provide the software and support. He described the framework as a response to failures identified after the Parkland shooting. The release did not provide local results or a measure of how the new software has performed in Cayuga County schools.
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