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ICYMI: DOJ School Safety Tip Line Saves Lives

Sep 27, 2022

ICYMI: DOJ School Safety Tip Line Saves Lives

MADISON, Wis. – Yesterday, Attorney General Josh Kaul and DOJ’s Office of School Safety released the second annual report on the success of the Speak Up, Speak Out school safety tip line. This report showed that DOJ’s trained analysts had received 136 potentially life-saving tips in just the last year.

The Speak Up, Speak Out school safety tip line is just one of many ways AG Kaul’s administration is delivering on public safety for Wisconsin families.

WSAW: Students encouraged to “Speak Up Speak Out”

Speak Up Speak Out encourages students to take ownership in their school’s safety. It’s run by the Office of School Safety which was created in response to the Parkland shooting in Florida in 2018.

Attorney general Josh Kaul said the program shows a 15.2 % increase in tips this year over last.

“Students who have used Speak Up Speak Out have seen that it’s an effective program, and that encourages not only those students, but their friends, classmates and teachers to use the program as well.” Attorney General Kaul said.

WEAU: Speak Up, Speak Out program grows in its second year

“We’ve received now over 4,000 contacts to Speak Up, Speak Out and they run the gamut,” Wisconsin Attorney General Josh Kaul said. “We’ve received a number of contacts about bullying. We’ve also received some contacts where there’s concern that a student might harm themselves. Sometimes there’s a concern that a student might harm others. In each of those cases, we have a trained analyst who knows how to respond.”

Tips can be submitted through the program’s website, over the phone, or through its app.

“Students often learn about concerns to safety before adults do,” Kaul said. “So, if reports are made early in the process, that can lead to an intervention before a student progresses along the pathway to violence, and that can help us address problems and keep kids safe.”

Channel 3000: ‘Speak Up, Speak Out’ Wisconsin school safety tip line sees 15% increase in reports
The program, which was rolled out in September 2020, has generated more than 4,000 tips since it started, including 1,951 from August 1, 2021 to July 31, 2022, according to an annual report released Monday. A total of 326 schools in Wisconsin received at least one tip in the last year.

NBC 15: Tips increase in second year of ‘Speak Up Speak Out’ reporting system
The DOJ said that bullying and threats of suicide were two of the most reported tips this most recent school year. The system received 136 “potentially life-saving tips” in the last school year.

Tips were resolved in just over three days, on average, and the most common outcomes were “parents notified” and “school disciplinary action.” The DOJ did note that tips can have more than one outcome.

Attorney General Josh Kaul described the program as “a huge success.”

Spectrum News: Report: Speak Up, Speak Out tips increased nearly 15% during its second year

“You can tell from those numbers, folks across the state are using Speak Up, Speak Out to get information about school safety,” Attorney General Josh Kaul said during a recent press conference at Sun Prairie East High School.

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