Crisis Ready Classrooms, School Safety in Yavapai County
"Crisis Ready Classrooms, School Safety in Yavapai County" is a multi-part series published in The Daily Courier in 2025. The series examines physical campus safety, technology, and how schools address mental health crises. The series was written by Hava Herzog and Abigail Celaya.
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| (Hava Herzog/Courier) |
Headline: Seconds Count: Are local schools ready for the worst-case scenario?
Published October 25, 2025, in The Daily Courier
Word Count: 1,213
In 2025, school shootings persist across the U.S., leading school officials and law enforcement to confront ongoing threats to student safety and search for effective prevention strategies. Recent data highlights the scope of the issue, with incidents reported at every level of K–12 education.
Since 1996, there have been 2,918 school shootings in the U.S, according to the K-12 School Shooting Database. A shooting is defined as every time a firearm is discharged on school property, and it does not have to be a mass killing, which is defined by U.S. statute as three or more fatalities in a single incident.
As a result of those shootings on school property, 2,385 victims were wounded, and 855 were killed.
Within the past 300 school shootings, 158 of those occurred at the high school level, 83 in elementary schools, and 36 in middle schools.
Cindy Daniels, superintendent of Chino Valley Unified School District, said each component of school safety is important. She has been in education for 38 years.
“School safety was never something that anyone ever talked about when I began my career in education,” Daniels said. “The very first time anyone talked about school safety was after Columbine, and that changed everything.”
Though the shooting at Columbine (Colorado) High School in 1999 was a turning point in history, as the nation saw a dramatic increase in school shootings over the years that followed, it was not the first in America’s history.
The earliest known school shooting happened in 1764 in what is now Greencastle, Pennsylvania. Four men entered the school, killed the schoolmaster and 10 children.
In Arizona, there have been 31 school shootings. This includes any incident where someone was shot on school property, whether a fight escalated, police shot at someone on school grounds, or someone shot at another student or multiple students.
Firearms remain the leading cause of death for children in the U.S., according to Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health. In response, school leaders and law enforcement in the local area have come together to identify how to best keep kids safe
Securing schools
Steve King, Yavapai County superintendent of schools, spoke about a scare he had while he was a district superintendent in Cottonwood in November 2023. He was in a meeting in the district office when his secretary told him there was a report of a school shooting and police were on site with their guns drawn.
“I sat there for a minute, and you have to gather yourself,” King said. “What was going through my head in that moment was, ‘this is it.’”
He went into the hallway, and the chief of police was there along with other armed officers. After they checked security footage, they saw there was no indication of a threat.
There was no shooting that day. A fourth grader from a different school had called in a false threat. But it still traumatized those who were involved and who had to follow protocols to ensure the school was safe.
“These are the most precious babies these people have in the world, and they want to know if their kid is safe, but you can never do enough,” King said.
King’s district was the first to implement the Raptor system in Arizona, a panic button for teachers and staff to access on their mobile phones. At any time, they can push one button and effect a lockdown. That day, Raptor helped ensure schools were locked down.
Planning
Daniels said it is crucial to have a plan on how to approach safety.
“Safety means so many different things; it’s not just physical perimeter safety, no one safety thing is really more important than another,” she said.
In the summer of 2024, Daniels said they had all their agency partners come for a meeting and discuss what role each group plays in safety. She said if they are not all on the same page, then they cannot coordinate effectively.
Yavapai County Sheriff’s Office (YCSO) and local law enforcement agencies have access to emergency maps, room numbers, building layouts, and even conduct trainings, including active shooter trainings on school campuses, so in case of tragedy, they are best prepared.
Components of school safety
Brett Dahl, interim superintendent of Humboldt Unified School District, said safety is the No. 1 priority. Safety drills, teacher training, assessments, and debriefs will be conducted to ensure safety is always improving.
“We really believe in preventing pieces instead of reacting to them,” Dahl said.
One preventive component of school safety is the Milestones Program. Superintendents, law enforcement, mental health partners and the court systems come together to intervene if a child is going to harm themselves or others.
King said he has had to use the program once in 24 years.
Schools have installed security cameras on their campuses, have school resource officers (SROs) park police cars out front, monitor who is entering schools, and have AI weapon-detecting technology. Though its main purpose is for preventative measures and to keep kids safe, it also enhances learning by cultivating a safe environment.
“If kids don’t feel safe at school, if staff don’t feel safe at school, nobody learns,” Daniels said.
Dahl said communication to both parents and students is important to make both parties aware of the potential risks to schools in case something ever does happen. Then everyone will be aware of what strategies and practices are in place. Like avoid, deny, defend, or run, hide, fight, which are current active shooter response protocols.
“Kids are the most important thing to a parent’s life; they entrust us to keep them safe,” Dahl said, communicating how important it is to keep parents in the loop.
Clark Tenney, superintendent of Prescott Unified School District, said years ago he used to get many parent emails after every school shooting; now, he hardly receives any. Still, he knows safety is always on the minds of everyone who sends their kids to school.
“It is absolutely on parents’ minds and my mind, all the time, how vulnerable our 6-year-old kids are and our teachers are,” Tenney said.
He said the statistics show that children are safe when they are at school, and active shooter situations are incredibly rare, despite how often they feel they arise in the news.
“They are much safer at school than any other place they go, with the exception of their own home,” Tenney said.
A look to the future
YCSO patrols a county the size of New Jersey, King said. Despite this, he believes Yavapai County is a safe one.
Schools must balance ensuring they have the proper safety mechanisms with limited finances and a duty to keep schools friendly.
Despite the needs of schools, school safety is expensive. King said that when they considered changing the locks in just one school, it would have cost a quarter of a million dollars. Resources are a challenge, especially for rural schools in the county.
“You look at fencing, that costs money, you look at cameras, that takes money, you look at staffing, that takes money,” King said.
Balancing keeping schools safe and creating a welcoming environment is a tightrope that school administrators are continuing to walk.
“Schools should be welcoming, happy places where kids and families want to be,” Daniels said.
Headline: Beyond badges, officers as mentors and protectors in schools
Published October 27, 2025 in The Daily Courier
Word Count: 1,481
An officer in uniform kneels to play baseball with an elementary school student, while another sits at the lunch table to hear the ‘chisme’ from middle schoolers. One helps tiny preschoolers across the crosswalk, greeting them with a smile and a high-five. Another encourages a high schooler to ask someone to the homecoming dance.
Throughout Yavapai County, school resource officers provide students with protection and mentorship. Securing the perimeter, checking doors are locked, while also providing students with a positive role model.
Tom Horne, Arizona superintendent of public instruction, said he has pushed hard to get more police officers into schools. When he took office, there were 190; now there are more than 560.
“My biggest nightmare was some maniac would come invade a school and kill 20 kids, and the kids would be gone, and the parents would never recover,” Horne said.
In January 2025, Horne said a man came into a Tucson school with a gun and a knife and said he was going to kill the students. He said the school safety officer, William Bonanno, who had been hired only two weeks prior, acted right away and arrested him before any damage could be done.
“We avoided one of these terrible tragedies that happens in other states by the skin of our teeth,” Horne said. “So, I have dedicated my strong priority to getting more police officers in the schools.”
School resource officers (SROs) are sworn law enforcement officers who are employed by local police departments but are assigned full-time to school campuses, and are allowed to make arrests. School safety officers (SSOs) are reserve police officers or peace officers, certified by the Arizona Peace Officer Standards, and work at schools.
SROs are paid for by the Arizona Department of Education’s School Safety Program, while SSOs are funded by Arizona’s school safety mini-grant funds for 18 months at a time. Often, school districts partner with local police departments, slitting the costs.
In the coming years, Horne said, they will ask the legislature to increase funding for police officers on campus. However, Horne said they do not expect to receive any money from the federal government in 2026.
A duty to protect
Matt Dean, assistant principal at Prescott High School and PUSD safety coordinator, monitors a number of cameras at his desk every morning. If an incident occurs, such as a fight or medical incident, he will go back and review the footage.
Later in the day, he makes his rounds at lunch – checking on students as they grab their meals and make conversation with their friends.
“The thing that really matters for us is active supervision. It’s very important in all safety-related matters right now, not just violence,” Dean said.
Active supervision is a key part of the role of an SRO.
Doug Hawk, SRO for Chino Valley High School, used to work in patrol as a field training officer before he came to work for the school this year. During the school year, Hawk said working on campus is a nice change of pace. At first, he was not sure if he would like the job or get along with the kids.
“I kind of like the kids now, they high-five me, talk to me, tell me who they are taking to HOCO (Homecoming), I’m learning all the lingo,” Hawk said.
Hawk will sweep the perimeter multiple times a day, check to see if any students are vaping, and speak with students who may be in legal trouble or experiencing issues at home. He also teaches law-related classes, on topics such as risk versus reward. During lockdown drills, he will go pull on the doors to ensure they are properly locked. Hawk said his main reason for being at the school is protection in case there is a shooter.
“If there is an active shooter on school property, you guys get your kids,” Hawk said, referencing a meeting he had with teachers. “Nothing is going to stop me from finding that bad guy.”
Hawk said he does not think all teachers should be armed; instead, he recommends that teachers get bats or golf clubs to keep in their classroom as a precautionary measure. He said if a crisis ever arises, they should be prepared.
“If push comes to shove, are you going to sit there and let someone take your life, or are you going to fight back?” Hawk said.
A shoulder to lean on
At the beginning of the day, Officer Mike Colegrove helps with drop off at Territorial Early Childhood Center. Preschoolers, first and second graders, cross the crosswalk with their adults, and each one gives him a big high-five. One kid sticks his hand out of a car window to give him a hand-drawn picture.
When he got back to his office, he stapled the picture to his wall. Before he moved offices, he said his wall was covered with pictures kids drew for him.
During the day, Officer Mike, as the kids call him, does rounds through the hallways, checking that every door is locked. At recess, Officer Mike said he would go down the slide and climb on playground equipment while checking that the perimeter is secure.
Officer Mike is retired and works full-time as an SSO. Before he retired, he worked at a prison.
“It’s unfortunate that there’s a job like this,” Officer Mike said. “But it’s very rewarding.”
Officer Mike said that when the school practices lockdown drills, the kids understand what to do. He said from a parent’s perspective, it is scary that small kids are ready to fight and are so well prepared, but from an officer’s perspective, it shows they are listening to directions.
Mat Gronek is an SSO for Del Rio Elementary School. His office is every Star Wars fanatic’s dream. With a Darth Vader sticker on his radio, he walked out to recess and played baseball with kids with a colorful, one-of-a-kind glove. He then accompanied students to lunch, where kids asked him to use his flashlight to light up their water bottles.
Gronek said he loves the elementary school grade level and would never want to work with another group of students. He feels as if he has found his sweet spot.
“I’m like the family dog,” Gronek said. “They can pull my tail, touch my ears, but it’s my job to protect them.”
Hector Torres, SRO for Heritage Middle School, said he feels like a big brother or father figure to the students. He has lived in Chino Valley nearly his entire life and even attended Heritage Middle School when he was a child.
“I like the culture, the farming,” Torres said, explaining why he has stayed. “The people in Chino are very friendly and law enforcement supporting, and they love us to death.”
Throughout the day, he disciplined two students who were about to start fighting outside and chatted with the students at their lunch tables — one student asked him to braid their hair. Torres has organized events such as Cookie with a Cop, where middle schoolers can interact with first responders, and a dodgeball event where eighth graders face off against the Police Department. He also loves to play cornhole, and when he gets the opportunity, he plays with students.
“I want them to get to know who I really am, not think of me as a robot cop,” Torres said.
Matthew Shaul, SRO for Pronghorn Ridge Middle School, has been with the Police Department since 2021.
Shaul said students he had in middle school will seek him out at high school games to tell him how good they are doing in school now, or that they have a better relationship with their parents. He said he will always tell them they are doing a great job, and he is proud of them.
“A lot of them have told me they are not getting into trouble as much now, ‘I remember the advice you gave,' Shaul said. "Instead of them being pulled into my office and thinking they are going to get arrested, I try to be more of a mentor and tell them the struggles I had when I was their age.”
Lead SRO Sgt. Tony Lawrence said he worked patrol and traffic before he came to the SRO division. He said they do a lot more mentoring in the schools than they do discipline.
“Coming to working with the kids, they still like the idea of the officers, they still ask you for stickers when you walk by,” Lawrence said.
Lawrence said building rapport with children is important because it extends past school incidents. He said there have been several times in the field where a crime will occur at a student’s house, and they are asking for the school resource officer.
“It doesn’t end here, it goes out in the real world as well,” Lawrence said.
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| (Hava Herzog/Courier) |
Headline: Behavioral threat assessment, a proactive approach to stop school violence before it happens
Published October 28, 2025 in The Daily Courier
Word Count: 1,384
There is no checklist for a student attacker. They can be of any gender, race or academic standing. A student may be well-liked or socially isolated, high-achieving or struggling — there are no specific personality traits or interests that can reliably indicate a potential for violence.
School safety goes beyond locking doors, officers on campus and cameras. Educators, law enforcement and mental health professionals use behavioral threat assessment as a systemic, problem-solving approach to violence prevention in schools. Threat assessment is designed to identify, evaluate and address potential threats before they result in harm.
How threat assessment works
There are a few recognized guidelines or models for behavioral threat assessment in schools, such as the National Threat Assessment Center (NTAC) guidelines, the Salem-Keizer Cascade model, and the Comprehensive School Threat Assessment Guidelines (CSTAG).
Though there are some differences, all call for the formation of a multidisciplinary, multiagency threat assessment team. They also outline steps to assess a threat and develop a plan for a student going forward.
Threat-assessment models are an outline to analyze the nature of a threat, such as a student’s motives, life events, inappropriate’ interests, history of violence or a student’s capacity to carry out an attack, among other factors.
There are multiple potential characteristics that could also be identified in youth at risk of violence. A student may have conflicted or limited parent cooperation, gang affiliation, or use drugs or alcohol. They may express feelings of isolation, resentment, or suffer from low self-esteem. They could have a mental health diagnosis or exhibit suicidal behavior. They may have access to weapons or exhibit an interest in weapons, violence, destruction, fire or explosions. The student themself may be a victim of violence or bullying.
Putting threat assessment into practice
When it comes to evaluating a potential at-risk student, Chino Valley Unified School District (CVUSD) Superintendent Cindy Daniels said she, CVUSD’s administrators and counselors are trained in the CSTAG model.
She described CSTAG as series of questions that help determine if a kid is just having a bad day or if they are vulnerable to harming themselves or others.
“It’s a way for us to methodically use a scientifically proven method to be able to get children the help that they need, keep that individual child safe and potentially keep others safe,” Daniels said.
The CSTAG model outlines five steps for threat assessment: evaluate the threat, attempt to resolve the threat as transient or fleeting, respond to a substantive threat, conduct a safety evaluation for a very substantive threat, and implement and monitor the safety plan.
CSTAG defines a threat as “a communication of intent to harm someone that may be spoken, written, gestured or expressed in some other form, such as via text messaging or other digital means.” CSTAG defines a serious substantive threat as “a threat to hit, fight or beat up” versus a very serious threat is the means to “kill, rape or cause severe injury with a weapon.”
CSTAG asks evaluators to consider the content and circumstances of a threat and whether it was an expression of humor, rhetoric, anger or frustration, or an actual intent to harm.
Daniels emphasized the importance of context, such as age, social development, emotional development or the presence of intellectual disabilities. She said they also consider if a student has access to weapons at home, if they have made threats in the past, if they are having a mental health crisis, and the nature of the threat.
Regardless, Daniels said, they always take every threat seriously and, in the event of expulsion, there is a law in place to prevent a child from going to another school.
According to Arizona Revised Statute 15-841, in the event of expulsion, “a school district may refuse to admit any pupil who has been expelled from another educational institution or who is in the process of being expelled from another educational institution.”
Daniels said it is a good law, and one that was not always an option.
“It’s to prevent children who are dangerous or violent in any way from going to the next school and doing the same thing,” Daniels said.
Community-wide collaboration: The Milestones Project
Behavioral threat assessment is also a component of the Milestones Project, which is available to any public or charter school in Yavapai County. The project was developed to create a system to identify and address youth at risk of violence at school, home or within the community and connect them with resources, according to the Yavapai County Education Service Agency website, yavapaicoesa.gov/teachers-and-administrators/milestones.
Potential ‘Milestones youth’ are identified any time a serious threat or risk of violence is made whether it involves another student, a teacher or the school, the website states. A potential Milestones youth may also have already completed an act of violence or have a history of violent acts.
The goal is to connect parents or guardians and their youth with community resources to prevent future acts of violence. With parental/guardian consent, Milestones establishes ongoing communication and collaboration between schools, parents or guardians, courts, law enforcement, mental health resources, and the Department of Child Safety (DCS), according to the website. Without parental permission, agencies are unable to share private information with one another.
Prescott Unified School District (PUSD) Superintendent Clark Tenney said that collaboration allows the team to “connect dots” right away, so all involved parties can be informed on the case at hand.
He said the number of potential Milestones cases per year varies, and he remembers a five-year period where PUSD had only a couple of potential Milestones kids. Instead of going through the Milestones process, those individuals and their families were given available resources.
He said a Milestones case is an “all-hands-on-deck” situation that requires parental involvement. He recalled that one year PUSD had as many as 10 potential cases. Tenney said a low percentage of those cases moved forward through the Milestones process.
“‘This kid has the intent and means to do this and there’s a lot of red flags and there’s a bunch of dots connecting to this,’” Tenney said referencing the instances when the program was utilized.
Subsequent actions depend on if a youth’s behavior is criminal. If there has been a referral to juvenile court for a crime, the court and juvenile probation will get involved and keep in contact with the Milestones team. If it is not criminal, then the Milestones team and the parents/guardians are gathered to determine next steps, share information, and allocate resources, all of which requires prior consent.
Yavapai County School Superintendent Steve King was elected to serve a four-year term in November 2024. King has been a teacher, principal and district superintendent among other roles in education. In his 25 years in Yavapai County, King said he personally utilized the program once.
He recalls a time about eight years ago when he was a school superintendent. A child was exhibiting concerning behavior, and the school quickly gathered a Milestones committee to assess the situation.
King said the mother, the child, chief of police, a county sheriff representative, a juvenile probation representative, a Department of Child Services representative, a representative from a local mental health agency, a teacher, a counselor, and the principal were all the in the same room within 24 hours to discuss the issue.
“There was a lot of eyes on this kid, there was a lot of services on this kid, and there was a lot of support with this family,” King said. “Do I think it prevented a school shooting? I don’t know, but it certainly was effective.”
Threat assessment policy stalled
According to Everytown Research and Policy, 11 states require in-school threat assessment teams. Those states are Florida, Illinois, Kentucky, Maryland, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, Texas, Vermont, Virginia and Washington.
The Arizona House of Representatives attempted to pass a school threat assessment policy during the 2020 legislative session. HB2089 would have required every public and charter school district governing board to adopt policies to establish threat assessment teams. It passed the House in February 2020 and died in the Senate in March, possibly as a result of the COVID shutdown.
To learn more about threat assessment, visit the National Threat Assessment Center’s website, secretservice.gov/protection/ntac. The Arizona Department of Education also has a behavioral threat information page on its website, azed.gov/wellness/sep/schoolthreatassessment.
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| (Hava Herzog/Courier) |
Headline: A balancing act, teachers walk the tightrope for safe and welcoming classrooms
Published October 29, 2025, in The Daily Courier
Word Count: 1,375
Teaching times tables, sounding out the alphabet, how to play trombone, how to write an essay — run, hide, fight. Along with their regular responsibilities, teachers are also trained how to respond and keep their classrooms safe in a crisis.
Mike Myrmel, Eighth grade science teacher at Liberty Traditional School
Mike Myrmel teaches eighth grade science at Liberty Traditional School, but before his time in education, Myrmel was an officer with Glendale Police Department and then Prescott Valley Police Department (PVPD). He had many roles in his 11 years with PVPD including patrol officer, field training officer, patrol corporal, and field training officer subject matter expert instructor. He was also a school resource officer (SRO) for Humboldt Unified School District (HUSD) for four years, and is an Army combat veteran.
“I loved the kids so much and they brought so much joy to my life that I decided I wanted to continue working with them, just in a different capacity,” Myrmel said. “I went into the classroom right after I retired.”
Myrmel said he worked at all the schools in HUSD as an SRO. He said he even gave up a promotion to take the SRO position, saying that he wanted something positive.
“The kids really saved my life in a way, bringing that positivity back into my life,” Myrmel said. “You’re not seeing the negative of life every single day anymore, seeing the positive instead, which is awesome.”
When it comes to school safety, Myrmel said HUSD is above a lot of the rest of the country: “I can speak to that from both sides of being the educator and also being the SRO.”
He said the school is receptive to safety suggestions, such as always locking doors. Another safety measure is training educators in “Avoid, Deny, Defend,” a survival protocol used in active threat situations, such as an active shooter event.
Myrmel was trained in the Avoid, Deny, Defend protocol as an officer, and helped to implement it across the district. The Avoid, Deny, Defend protocol was developed as a means to assess a situation based on where a threat is located and the best mode of action, especially in active-shooter situations. If the threat is far away, it is encouraged to get away by any means. If the threat is closer, barricading or fighting back is encouraged. Myrmel said it puts “common sense” back into crisis response. He said teachers and students practice the measures throughout the year.
To communicate the seriousness of safety drills, Myrmel said he simply has a frank discussion with his students.
“It’s a little easier for me with my background,” Myrmel said. “But I explain to them … bad people will do bad things.”
He said he explained to students that they could use the science tables as barricades and rope to tie the door handles together. He said if there was a threat in the classroom, he would be the one in front. It is a conversation he has with students every time there is a drill, about twice a quarter. Myrmel said it needs to be muscle memory for students and teachers.
“It’s a part of our world and we need to be worried about it and be able to respond appropriately if it were to happen,” Myrmel said. “These things do happen. We need to always treat this situation like it could be absolutely serious, and we need to practice it as if it were the real thing.”
Myrmel compared safety drills to wearing a seatbelt, it is always better to be safe.
“It’s a horrible reality, something that’s in our world and we have to practice for just in case,” Myrmel said. “The percentages are so incredibly low that it’s going to happen to you as an individual, but I would rather be safe. It’s like wearing a seatbelt.”
Harrison Chislock, economics and government teacher at Prescott High School
Harrison Chislock teaches economics and Advanced Placement government at Prescott High School (PHS). Chislock has taught at PHS for 15 years. Besides being knowledgeable about credit cards, student loans and budgeting, Chislock is also informed about school safety at PHS.
For the past three years, he has been on the school safety team. The team meets at least once a quarter to discuss everything from campus security to student health. Additionally, PHS’ principal, Adam Neely, created a student group called ‘The Badger Pack.’ It consists of two students from each grade who offer the student perspective on school safety.
“Whether that be physical safety, drug and alcohol use, or bullying or fights or whatever it might be, that to me is a huge part of the equation,” Chislock said. “Us as adults might see one thing, but students are actually in class interacting with one another.”
He said overall he believes PHS is doing well with implementing school safety. Since he has been on the school safety team, PHS has moved to a single-point entry and installed more cameras.
“I think we were doing good before and I think we’re doing even better now,” Chislock said. “Mr. Neely’s philosophy, especially for this year, is ‘Let’s move from good to great,’ and so we’re constantly trying to do better than the year before. I think we’ve made huge strides, especially in the last couple of years on multiple fronts.”
Haylee Kile, 3rd-grade teacher at Abia Judd Elementary School
Haylee Kile teaches third grade at Abia Judd Elementary School. She is also the coordinator for Abia Judd’s school safety team. She said she gathers teachers, administrators, a counselor, office personnel, and sometimes parents, to address concerns and make sure everyone is following safety protocols.
“Safety has always been on my mind,” Kile said. “When I was a student-teacher years ago, we had an incident that happened up in Flagstaff. It was when the robo-calls were happening, and they were saying they were in the school, SWAT came. It made a huge impact on me and how safety in schools is needed.”
Kile said she also has a daughter who attends Abia Judd.
“As a parent and a teacher, I feel comfortable having my daughter here because I know everything we have in place,” Kile said.
When asked how she balances a welcoming and safe environment, Kile said she looks at the child “as a whole.”
“When you look at the whole child and then you put safety precautions in place, it all just goes together,” Kile said. “Not just looking at how we can keep the building safe, but we’re also looking at them, the whole child, their mind and how they’re feeling. I feel like that really goes hand in hand.”
When it comes to safety drills, the conversation is different for every age group. Abia Judd Principal Jeannette Bray said all teachers are taught the “Run, Hide, Fight” protocol. The Run, Hide, Fight protocol, similar to Avoid, Deny and Defend are emergency response guidelines to be utilized in an active shooter event. She said those protocols are discussed with middle and high schoolers, but not with elementary kids.
“You very much have to find this balance between training children to react to a specific situation versus drilling them with relatively common situations,” Bray said.
Bray said when it comes to common situations such as fire drills, a shelter in place, or during a storm, it is best to not go into too much detail regarding why.
“That can be pretty traumatizing for kids, even up at the middle school and high school level, let alone elementary level,” Bray said. “It’s more about training the teachers to be able to work with students and then working with students about following directions.”
According to 2023 statistics from Pew Research, 41% of public K-12 teachers are concerned about a shooting occurring at their school. Thirty-one percent are not too worried, 11% are very worried, 7% are extremely worried, another 7% are not worried at all, and 2% chose not to answer.
Headline: Community partnerships strengthen school safety efforts across districts
Published October 30, 2025, in The Daily Courier
Word Count: 1,592
Word Count: 1,592
Prescott Valley Police Department Chief Bob Ticer has been in law enforcement for 36 years. He grew up in Prescott, following in his father’s footsteps to join the police force.
Ticer said the relationship between the Police Department and the schools is bigger and stronger than it has ever been. He said it’s not just the SROs that help with school safety, but the entire Police Department. There is always an officer able to respond to a school. He also meets with the superintendent once a month to discuss safety.
“This police department, community, and HUSD believe children are precious commodities in our communities,” Ticer said. “Our schools are the places we want to have the safest. That’s our goal is to keep kids safe.”
When Ticer grew up, he said there were no SROs, and police officers were only on campus if someone was in serious trouble. Now there are several SROs on HUSD campuses.
“When it first started, there was worries it would be an enforcement model of arresting kids and taking them to jail,” Ticer said. “Once they got past that and saw it’s a coaching, mentoring and security role, I see a real positive interaction with SROs and the kids and teachers and staff.”
Along with SROs, the Police Department also ensures officers are trained in active shooter situations, know how to get into a school safety and can deactivate an active threat.
Amy Bonney, chief of Prescott Police Department, said there is a fantastic relationship between their department and PUSD. She said it’s critical they main that relationship so they can communicate effectively and work together to enhance the safety of children and schools.
Bonney said she believes PUSD is doing a good job with school safety and that together they are doing all they can to make sure students are safe and can thrive in their environments and can learn. Still, there is always more work to be done.
“We have to strive to be ahead of the curve to the best of our ability, keeping our minds open to new ideas and focused on the most important thing, our kids,” Bonney said.
Throughout her career, Bonney has seen the needs of school safety change.
“While it has always been a concern, we have adapted to the ever-changing lens through which we view threats to our schools and our children. We always have to be willing to learn and willing to change the way we do things. The safety of our students is of utmost importance.”
Joshua McIntire, chief of police for Chino Valley, has been working for the department since 2015. He said they have always maintained their relationship with the school district and that they have frequent meetings with them so they can keep schools a safe environment.
“Problems or issues that have happened on campus have decreased significantly over the past years,” McIntire said, referencing when the SRO grant was put in place. “Nationwide, school districts, especially in Arizona, have had a big push to put an officer in ever school, if possible, which I think is great.”
McIntire said schools are moving in the right direction. To avoid the worst case scenario, they advocate for “if you see something, say something” to reduce critical incidents.
“You have to take a proactive approach to it,” McIntire said. “You can’t be reactive to it and just respond to issues as they come up. Having someone on campus that has that close relationship with the students and head off issues before they start has decreased major issues, here.”
Being proactive also means practicing scenarios as if they were real. This month, Yavapai County Sheriff’s Office (YCSO) partnered with CVPD to complete a comprehensive active shooter threat training exercise on Chino Valley High School’s campus. The training simulated an active shooter event, and officers practiced establishing protocols, neutralizing a threat, clearing the premises, and ensuring safety. It tested response times, communication, and tactical procedures.
YCSO active shooter training
YCSO Capt. Jarrod Winfrey said they practice these drills at every school. He said officers will look through the schools to understand the layout, hiding spots, and how they need to respond.
"The safety of our students and our community is our highest priority," Sheriff David Rhodes said. "This training is not just about law enforcement response; it's about building a seamless, unified command system.”
A team of local nurses and emergency medical personnel participated by setting up a triage area and simulated on-site medical care. The training was conducted while school was not in session.
Juvenile Justice Center
Yavapai County’s Juvenile Center believes that every child can be successful. Rather than focusing on punishment, the Juvenile Justice Center focuses on the needs of the kid and provides resources to the family.
Juvenile probation is an alternative to detention, meaning a youth can still remain in the community, attend school, counseling, and fulfill their court-ordered consequences and assignments, according to Yavapai County’s Juvenile Probation webpage. Supervised probation typically spans 6 months to a year, depending on the case.
Juvenile Probation Supervisor Daniel Lammers said how they approach problems in juvenile probation is a lot different. He said majority of the problems stem from dysfunction within the home.
“We are focused so heavily within a short window we have with a kid and it’s really a full spectrum of the entire family,” Lammers said. “So, helping a kid work through some problems by themselves isn’t usually the totality of the answer. It’s bringing in the parents, the guardians, their friend groups, and really helping create the structure they need to be successful.”
Resources include counseling interventions through Polara Health, Spectrum Healthcare, Child and Family Support Services (CFSS), or a behavioral health residential treatment facility. There is also the Bridges program, which is an alternative to detention and out-of-school suspension. Law enforcement, schools, or behavioral health practitioners can refer a kid to the Bridges Center after they have been arrested or when they need supervision and less disruption.
“[Those resources] really help kids if they’re struggling not knowing what to do or the parents just need some additional tools,” Lammers said. “We’re working to make sure that they have access to those resources, and they can use them to better help their integration back in the community.”
Lammers said juvenile probation has a very close relationship with the school districts. There are three juvenile probation officers who work for the county. He said probation will regularly meet with school administrators, school resource officers, and the school superintendent from each school district. He said communication allows them to address difficulties and focus on early intervention, so kids can get enrolled in resources and get back to school.
“If we do have a kid who has a gun charge or a sex offense, then usually it’s communication with the school,” Lammers said. “A lot of them have concerns with behavior and that’s where probation help out with the school.”
According to the Yavapai County Juvenile Probation website, between August 2021 and June 2022, the top seven offenses were criminal damage, runaway, tobacco or vaping, assault, marijuana, disorderly conduct, and truancy. Truancy is intentional and unauthorized absence from school, and it was the No. 1 offense.
Probation Resource Officers (PROs) support schools and law enforcement with issues such as school violence, substance use, and truancy. PROs are assigned to schools to assist with those issues.
For youth who are detained, there is Prescott Lakes Parkway School, a school inside of the Yavapai County Juvenile Justice Center. Prescott Lakes Parkway is fully accredited, operates on a regular schedule, and teaches curriculum that aligns with state standards.
Mental Health
Jessica Stickel is the student wellbeing director at Prescott High School (PHS). She said PUSD schools are equipped with social workers, school counselors, academic advisors, mental health therapists, and character coaches.
Stickel said overall, the biggest concern she is seeing is students struggling with anxiety. Some students are anxious high achievers while others need support figuring out their “blueprint.” Others may come from challenging families or find that social media is perpetuating their anxiety.
“Being able to work with students on helping them control what they can and let go of what they can’t,” Stickel said.
Since she has worked in counseling, she has seen an increase in mental health awareness. She said she works with students to prioritize things and remove distractions.
“I think that it’s not just students, it’s adults experiencing it,” Stickel said. “Being able to understand the fast-paced world we live in with the abundance of choices and the amount of distractions.”
PHS offers different programs to promote students’ well-being. Stickel runs a girl’s group at PHS, where they do activities such as a “walk and talk” or visit the Grand Canyon where they identify stressors and connect with peers. Badger Buddies is a program where PHS teens serve as role models to younger students by doing activities and lessons on good character. PHS also has an Adventure Club that focuses on outdoor education through backpacking, mountain biking, paddling, and more.
Community resources
She said sometimes students are misunderstood because their behavior could be interpreted as disrespectful or disengaged when really it could be a need for connection, emotional regulation, or a need to be seen and heard.
“If kids aren’t feeling seen, heard, like they belong somewhere, [feel] like people don’t notice them, feel like they are capable of doing well and feeling well, then that is going to impact their education,” Stickel said. “When you feel better, you do better."
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