                                 CODE OF VIRGINIA

SCHOOL SAFETY AUDITS AND SCHOOL CRISIS, EMERGENCY MANAGEMENT, AND MEDICAL
EMERGENCY RESPONSE PLANS REQUIRED (§ 22.1-279.8)

A. For the purposes of this section, unless the context requires otherwise:
			&#8220;School crisis, emergency management, and medical emergency response
plan&#8221; means the essential procedures, operations, and assignments required
to prevent, manage, and respond to a critical event or emergency, including
natural disasters involving fire, flood, tornadoes, or other severe weather;
loss or disruption of power, water, communications or shelter; bus or other
accidents; medical emergencies, including cardiac arrest and other
life-threatening medical emergencies; student or staff member deaths;
explosions; bomb threats; gun, knife or other weapons threats; spills or
exposures to hazardous substances; the presence of unauthorized persons or
trespassers; the loss, disappearance or kidnapping of a student; hostage
situations; violence on school property or at school activities; incidents
involving acts of terrorism; and other incidents posing a serious threat of harm
to students, personnel, or facilities. The plan shall include a provision that
the Department of Criminal Justice Services and the Virginia Criminal Injuries
Compensation Fund shall be contacted immediately to deploy assistance in the
event of an emergency as defined in the emergency response plan when there are
victims as defined in &#xA7; 19.2-11.01. The Department of Criminal Justice
Services and the Virginia Criminal Injuries Compensation Fund shall be the lead
coordinating agencies for those individuals determined to be victims, and the
plan shall also contain current contact information for both agencies.
			&#8220;School safety audit&#8221; means a written assessment of the safety
conditions in each public school to (i) identify and, if necessary, develop
solutions for physical safety concerns, including building security issues, and
(ii) identify and evaluate any patterns of student safety concerns occurring on
school property or at school-sponsored events. Solutions and responses shall
include recommendations for structural adjustments, changes in school safety
procedures, and revisions to the school board&#8217;s standards for student
conduct.

B. The Virginia Center for School and Campus Safety, in consultation with the
Department of Education, shall develop a list of items to be reviewed and
evaluated in the school safety audits required by this section. Such items shall
include (i) those incidents reported to school authorities pursuant to &#xA7;
22.1-279.3:1; (ii) a school inspection walk-through using a standardized
checklist provided by the Virginia Center for School and Campus Safety, which
shall incorporate crime prevention through environmental design principles; and
(iii) specific technology systems, including physical security technologies,
emergency telecommunication systems, and associated technology including
equipment and software.
			The Virginia Center for School and Campus Safety shall prescribe a
standardized report format for school safety audits, additional reporting
criteria, and procedures for report submission, which may include instructions
for electronic submission.
			Each local school board shall require all schools under its supervisory
control to annually conduct school safety audits, as defined in this section,
consistent with such list and in collaboration with the chief law-enforcement
officer of the locality or his designee. As part of each such audit, the school
board shall create a detailed and accurate floor plan for each public school
building in the local school division or shall certify that the existing floor
plan for each such school is sufficiently detailed and accurate. In addition, a
component of each such audit shall include a review of the school&#8217;s
comprehensive plan for closures during public health emergencies.
			The results of such school safety audits shall be made public within 90 days
of completion pursuant to this subsection. The local school board shall retain
authority to withhold or limit the release of any security plans, walk-through
checklists, floor plans, and specific vulnerability assessment components as
provided in subdivision 4 of &#xA7; 2.2-3705.2. The completed walk-through
checklist shall be made available to the chief law-enforcement officer of the
locality or his designee. Each school shall maintain a copy of the school safety
audit, which may exclude such security plans, walk-through checklists, and
vulnerability assessment components, within the office of the school principal
and shall make a copy of such report available for review upon written request.
			Each school shall submit a copy of its school safety audit to the relevant
school division superintendent. The division superintendent shall collate and
submit all such school safety audits, in the prescribed format and manner of
submission, to the Virginia Center for School and Campus Safety and shall make
available to the chief law-enforcement officer of the locality the results of
such audits for his review and recommendations.

C. The division superintendent shall establish a school safety audit committee
to include, if available, representatives of parents, teachers, local law
enforcement, emergency services agencies, local community services boards, and
judicial and public safety personnel. The school safety audit committee shall
review the completed school safety audits and submit any plans, as needed, for
improving school safety to the division superintendent for submission to the
local school board. The division superintendent or his designee and the school
safety audit committee may meet annually on the grounds of any public school in
the local school division with the chief law-enforcement officer of the locality
or a designee from the local law-enforcement agency to discuss the school safety
audit completed for such school.

D. Each school board shall ensure that every school that it supervises shall
develop a written school crisis, emergency management, and medical emergency
response plan, consistent with the definition provided in this section, and
shall include the chief law-enforcement officer, the fire chief, the chief of
the emergency medical services agency, the executive director of the relevant
regional emergency medical services council, and the emergency management
official of the locality, or their designees, in the development of such plans.
Each school division shall designate an emergency manager. The Department of
Education and the Virginia Center for School and Campus Safety shall provide
technical assistance to the school divisions of the Commonwealth in the
development of the school crisis, emergency management, and medical emergency
response plans that describe the components of a medical emergency response plan
developed in coordination with local emergency medical services providers, the
training of school personnel and students to respond to a life-threatening
emergency, and the equipment required for this emergency response. The local
school board, the chief law-enforcement officer, the fire chief, the chief of
the emergency medical services agency, the executive director of the relevant
regional emergency medical services council, and the emergency management
official of the locality, or their designees, shall annually review the written
school crisis, emergency management, and medical emergency response plans. The
local school board shall have the authority to withhold or limit the review of
any security plans and specific vulnerability assessment components as provided
in subdivision 4 of &#xA7; 2.2-3705.2. The local school division superintendent
shall certify this review in writing to the Virginia Center for School and
Campus Safety no later than August 31 of each year.
			Upon consultation with local school boards, division superintendents, the
Virginia Center for School and Campus Safety, and the Coordinator of Emergency
Management, the Board of Education shall develop, and may revise as it deems
necessary, a model school crisis, emergency management, and medical emergency
response plan for the purpose of assisting the public schools in the
Commonwealth in developing viable, effective crisis, emergency management, and
medical emergency response plans. Such model shall set forth recommended
effective procedures and means by which parents can contact the relevant school
or school division regarding the location and safety of their school children
and by which school officials may contact parents, with parental approval,
during a critical event or emergency.

E. Each school board shall ensure that every public school it supervises employs
at least one school administrator who has completed, either in-person or online,
school safety training for public school personnel conducted by the Virginia
Center for School and Campus Safety in accordance with subdivision A 1 of &#xA7;
9.1-184. However, such requirement shall not apply if such required training is
not available online.

F. Each division superintendent shall annually designate an employee in the
local school division as the division safety official whose duty is to receive
all reports required pursuant to subsection A of &#xA7; 19.2-83.1 and
&#xA7;&#xA7; 19.2-291.1 and 19.2-299.3 and shall include such designation in the
collated packet of school safety audits submitted to the Virginia Center for
School and Campus Safety pursuant to subsection B. The designation required by
this subsection shall include updated contact information for the division
safety official, including (i) a current mailing address, (ii) a current working
daytime phone number, and (iii) a current functional email address. It shall be
the duty of the division superintendent to update contact information required
by this subsection within 48 hours of any change to such contact information.

HISTORY: 1997, c. 593; 1999, cc. 475, 516, § 22.1-278.1; 2001, cc. 436, 440,
688, 820, 841; 2002, cc. 166, 221, 229, 235; 2003, c. 801; 2004, c. 690; 2005,
c. 904; 2006, c. 43; 2007, c. 44; 2009, cc. 222, 269; 2012, c. 418; 2013, c.
609; 2014, cc. 7, 158; 2015, cc. 502, 503; 2017, c. 778; 2019, cc. 141, 410,
487, 488; 2020, c. 338; 2022, cc. 21, 22, 57; 2023, cc. 282, 283; 2024, c. 429;
2025, cc. 232, 234, 573, 581.