A number of dedicated professionals comprise the Department of Public Safety, including 36 Campus Protection Officers assigned to each school and six School Resource Officers, who are fully commissioned officers, assigned to each high school. The TPS Department of Public Safety Dispatch Center is a 24-hour a day, seven days a week operation. The department’s main phone number is 419-671-8293.

There is a School Resource Officer (or SRO) assigned to each high school. Their top priority is to protect students and staff members. Fully commissioned police officers, they have full arrest power and patrol the schools looking for hazards. They also investigate crimes and take crime reports. They DO NOT enforce the discipline code. These officers keep the peace when situations get tense. They will get involved in disciplinary issues, but only if they need to keep the peace. Please know that these officers are trained in de-escalation, so they try to handle situations without having to arrest anyone. Officers usually let school administrators handle discipline code violations. The SROs will mentor and encourage students and will help to find lost students and track down parents if students are not picked up.

There are a total of 36 Campus Protection Officers in the district. They are not sworn officers. Their role is to support staff members and enforce school rules. They assist in keeping the peace by patrolling the halls and the school grounds to ensure that students get to classes safely. The CPOs are responsible for reporting unsafe conditions.

Required by the Ohio Department of Education, these plans are approximately 80 pages long and include detailed plans for various types of emergencies. They are individualized for each school. One of the requirements of these plans is that school districts must conduct emergency drills, including for fire, tornadoes and active-shooter scenarios (which is why we have implemented A.L.I.C.E. training). All plans MUST be approved by the state.

Please understand that ALL threats are taken seriously and will be investigated thoroughly. All threat reports are forwarded to the Toledo Police Department, which will evaluate the threat and share the information with the FBI if warranted. This includes threats that are made verbally or via social media. School threats made using social media will be passed on to the TPD Computer Crimes Section. Toledo Public Schools has sophisticated tools to track down the person who initiated a threat and, once found, that person will face disciplinary and/or criminal charges.

One more note: The criminal courts also take school threats very seriously. Judges will look at the impact the threat made on the school operation because school threats take a lot of time and resources to investigate – meaning SROs and TPD detectives are taken away from their other serious duties. Please make sure your children understand that making threats has serious consequences.

First, please tell your children not to spread rumors. The more a rumor is spread, the more difficult it is to investigate. In addition, please talk to your children about See Something, Say Something. Instruct your children if they become aware of a threat, they should immediately tell an officer or a member of the school staff. If someone makes an electronic threat, your child should save it or screen shot it then report it. Many school attacks have been averted by students or parents advising law enforcement.

All the new schools have comprehensive camera systems that can be accessed by the principals and the assistant principals from their computers. In addition, the Public Safety dispatcher can access the cameras in real time. The TPS and TPD SROs can access the camera system as well. In the event of an emergency, the dispatcher can give real time information to TPS and TPD officers handling the call. There are more than 3000 cameras in the system.

Correct, up to date information plays a huge role in keeping your child safe. Keep your information – including your emergency contact information - up to date with your children’s school. We cannot release a child to a person if he or she are not on the emergency contact list. Remember, when you are selecting people to serve as emergency contacts, make sure they are people you trust, will be responsible if they must pick up your child – and live within a reasonable distance of the school.

ALICE is an emergency response protocol that provides various response options in the event of an active intruder incident. Although ALICE is normally thought of as a response protocol for active shooter incidents, the techniques can be used for responding to various types of emergencies that occur in or around a school.

Hundreds of school districts and private businesses around the country are using ALICE as their emergency response protocol. ALICE was selected by TPS because it allows for various responses to emergency situations. In the past, many emergency response protocols focused solely on lockdowns. By providing staff members with multiple response options, we are enhancing the opportunity for staff and students to remain safe.

Alert - Staff members must keep alert for suspicious and/or dangerous activity and get the word out regarding any danger.

Lockdown – Involves locking and potentially barricading doors to secure students and staff within a room.

Inform - Involves communicating any suspicious/dangerous activity to office staff members, who will communicate and keep the building informed and updated. Communication empowers staff to make better decisions as to what action they should take (lockdown, evacuate, counter) to enhance safety.

Counter - Some people believe that counter means that we teach people how to fight the intruder. In reality, counter involves techniques used to distract and confuse the intruder, providing valuable time for students and staff members to take other actions or gain control of a situation. As a last resort, if an intruder gains entry into an occupied room, the decision may be made to swarm the intruder in order to take control of him. When considering the use of the counter strategy, the age of the students must be taken into account. 

Evacuate - Depending on the proximity of the danger, leaving the building and gaining as much distance from the intruder as possible may be the safest action.

Advise students that ALICE is designed to keep them safe in the event of a dangerous situation. Like fire drills or tornado drills, ALICE drills teach students what to do in case of an emergency. Younger children should be advised that their teacher has been trained on methods to keep them safe, so they should simply do what the teacher tells them to do during an emergency. Older students should be familiar with the ALICE concepts because in the event of a life-threatening emergency, they should know what they need to do. In addition, it is not unusual for older students to take independent actions to keep themselves safe.

ALICE drills should be conducted because it is critical that we test the response of students and staff members to threatening situations. Under the stress of a real emergency, we cannot count on staff members knowing how to implement ALICE protocols if they have not had the opportunity to actually experience performing the tasks.The more practice students and staff members have, the better they will perform in an emergency.

When conducting ALICE drills, we always keep in mind that we do not want to unduly frighten or cause stress to students or staff members. ALICE drills are used as learning opportunities. We will never conduct an unannounced drill; each drill is scheduled in advance with the principal. Prior to the beginning of each drill, the principal will make an announcement over the PA system and repeat twice, Attention students and staff this is a drill. We conduct very low key, non-aggressive drills. We do not use anything that looks like a weapon and we do not use loud noises that sound like weapons.