Partnership
A partnership among schools, mental health providers, juvenile justice, and law enforcement is a required component of Safe Schools/Healthy Students (SS/HS) projects. The partnership is a broad one, bringing together the efforts of all partners and creating opportunities for collaborative work among all four systems. Sites build on preexisting coalitions focused around the needs of children and youth and develop a memorandum of understanding specifying SS/HS project roles and responsibilities. Most sites have multiple partners with varying levels of responsibility for directly implementing activities proposed within the grant.
Whatever your partnership’s history, your initiative’s success will depend on the strength of your partnership. Without working collaborations between agencies and services representing the four systems brought together by SS/HS grants, it will be impossible to address the five elements of the initiative successfully and to achieve the systemic changes your partnership anticipates. Therefore, a purposeful and measured approach to growing and strengthening your partnership is essential.
Required PartnersPreventing violence and promoting healthy student development cannot be accomplished by schools working alone; partnership is key to SS/HS’s success. | Developing PartnershipsA partnership can be characterized by its purpose, structure, and processes—a characterization that determines its level of collaboration: |
Family InvolvementFamilies are key to the success of all of your SS/HS activities. Partnering with families can strengthen programs and services; bring important voices to the table to address student challenges and help to ensure program sustainability. |
