Today’s school safety and security challenges are multifaceted and complex. School Board officials being the prominent leaders of their school communities are often faced with challenges and questions regarding school safety. There is no single action that will, by itself, make our schools safe. Protecting students and staff is a tremendous moral and legal responsibility that requires a comprehensive approach to these challenges. Solutions to these challenges must be pursued across all areas of emergency preparedness: prevention, protection, mitigation, response and recovery; however, a modern and effective security infrastructure is a central component of any comprehensive school safety strategy. When other prevention efforts fail, facility security measures are critical to protection, mitigation and response. With this comes a layered approach to safety and security that is essential to addressing a broad range of threats. As each successive layer provides specific life safety components to detect, deter, delay and deny the threat from doing harm to the school environment. Life Safety Components are important in the District Wide, Property Perimeter, Parking Lots, Building Perimeter, and interiors of the schools. In this presentation the audience will learn about the leading practices and components that can be deployed in the layers of security around our schools.