As they gathered at the Georgia Capitol on Monday, there were fresh sentiments among the families and colleagues of the dead shot at Apalachee High last September.
However, they gained strength by witnessing the signing of a bill that they claim may stop coming shootings.
Gov. House Bill 268, a broad-ranging piece of legislation signed by Brian Kemp, a requiring public schools to detect, assess, and alleviate possible threats made by students, and make plans to assist students in need get cognitive wellness support. With Kemp’s name, it became effective.
Before signing the bill, Kemp said,” Ensuring the safety of all those in our universities is and will always be a major priority.”
Additionally, the Republican governor authorized a number of other education-related charges, including one that would ban trans women from participating in high school’s female sports teams and one that would further support and support charter schools.
In the legislative process, state representative Allen Persinger, R-Winder, changed the language in House Bill 268 to include language from three Senate bills that addressed school safety. Local institution systems must adopt a panic call system that communicates directly to emergency services in order to comply with the changes.
Ilan and Lori Alhadeff, the parents who were responsible for some of the passage of that act, were present at the bill signing service. Alyssa, their child, was killed in the 2018 shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida. The government was flanked by the teacher’s relatives who died in Barrow County’s Apalachee shooting.
Richard Aspinwall remarked,” It always hurts, but this is part of the therapeutic approach.” I don’t want this to occur to anyone else. It must stop, I suppose.
Additionally, changes to the bill require schools to inform students who transfer into other schools about disciplinary issues with students who are transferred from another schools, and enable juveniles to be tried as adults for violent acts as well as conspiracy to commit a number of violent crimes.
Colt Gray, next 14, entered a not guilty plea in court, according to court documents. The girl charged with killing four people and injuring others in the Apalachee shooting, entered a not innocent appeal.
He was charged with the murders of Aspinwall, teacher Cristina Irimie, two 14-year-old students, Mason Schermerhorn and Christian Angulo, as well as four counts of felony murder.
House Speaker , Jon Burns, who held a number of meetings with educators, parents, and students from all over the state to discuss what needed to be done to make schools safer, has made the legislation a priority.
By providing resources for students when they need them,” I’m confident that the policy and resources established by House Bill 268 will save lives that we will never even save,” Burns said on Monday.
The Georgia Emergency Management and Homeland Security Agency is in charge of determining what constitutes a credible threat under the proposed legislation. Additionally, the organization offers training to schools to assist with the creation and implementation of those plans.
If the threat had been investigated and verified by local law enforcement, the names of the students who had made threats, and the student’s social worker had been able to assess them, the system would have their names.
Parents of Black and Muslim boys claimed during hearings on the bill that their children might be unfairly targeted if their remarks were viewed as more threatening than intended. Parents or students can petition for their removal from the system, according to lawmakers ‘ clarification.
Teachers, principals, school counselors, and school resource officers could just be among the people who will have access to the information. According to the type of threat, each school decides whether to pass that information on to law enforcement, which would only be aware of certain students.
The possibility of abuse is arguably always present, according to Roland Behm, a mental health advocate who backs the measure. However, it is incumbent on parents and community members to take active part in the work we do with schools to ensure that we have a more thoughtful process rather than just a quick response to something someone is offended by.
This bill, which would have likely faced stiff opposition from the Republican-controlled General Assembly, does not have any gun restrictions.
Although the majority of Democrats supported the bill, they had hoped to incorporate it into efforts to pass gun safety laws. The bill’s final version received 154 out of 180 votes in the House and 45 out of 56 in the Senate.
Behm said,” If we wait around for the perfect, we never get the good.” ” There is always a new session,” the saying goes.
Other components of the bill are listed below:
— It might prompt a social worker to visit a student who stops going to school without giving any explanation.
— It would establish a secret forum where anyone could report students who might pose a threat to their peers, staff, students, or themselves.
— It would also place mental health counselors who would connect students to local resources for support and behavioral health care.
Additionally, Kemp signed legislation on Monday that would allow Georgia to join the interstate compact for school psychologists and allow doctors who are licensed in other states to practice in this state. Additionally, he signed a bill that would require schools with high absenteeism rates to review the reasons why students aren’t enrolled in classes.
If they aren’t in school, Kemp said,” Our children cannot learn.”
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The Atlanta Journal-Constitution, 2025.
distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.
