For many, the holidays are full of joy and wonder but, for others, the holidays and the cold winter days that follow can be the hardest. If you know someone who is struggling, or just want to promote general awareness, consider sharing information on 988 - the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline, as well as Safe2Help Illinois.

When individuals contact 988, "they will be connected to trained counselors that are part of the existing Lifeline network. These trained counselors will listen, understand how their problems are affecting them, provide support, and connect them to resources if necessary."

Safe2Help Illinois "offers students a safe, confidential way in which to share information that might help prevent suicides, bullying, school violence or other threats to school safety. This program is not intended to suspend, expel, or punish students. Rather, the goal is to get students to 'Seek Help Before Harm.'”

Additionally, the Illinois School and Campus Safety Resource Center website includes resources on its K-12 Mental Health and K-12 Suicide pages and Higher Ed Mental Health and Higher Ed Suicide pages.

The Illinois School and Campus Safety Program, in partnership with Safer Schools Together, is pleased to announce 3 upcoming sessions of the Digital Threat Assessment class being held via Zoom. Digital Threat Assessment training will enable participants to establish a framework to better assess all threats by constructing and considering the digital baseline of a threat maker by locating, documenting, and evaluating social media data through a threat assessment lens. A significant portion of the day will be spent engaging in hands-on exercises on the most prevalent social media platforms and associated search applications. For more information and to register, click the corresponding link for the session you would like to attend.

The Illinois School and Campus Safety Program is pleased to announce the class Advanced Digital Threat Assessment will be held on April 19th from 9:30 am-4:00 pm via Zoom. Building upon the Digital Threat Assessment class by Safer Schools Together, Advanced Digital Threat Assessment advances participants' understanding of finding and curating relevant digital information consistent with real-life digital threat assessment data gathering scenarios. Significant engagement and hands-on practice will take place as participants are assembled into investigative teams and given a true-to-life mock scenario. For more information and to register, click here.