Last week, after one year of operation of the Safe2Say program, which was created following Governor Wolf’s signing of Act 44 in 2018, Attorney General Josh Shapiro announced that Safe2Say Something PA has reached 40,382 tips from on the state’s anonymous reporting system for schools, students, and community members. Of those tips, 6,847 were categorized as ‘life-safety,’ whereby a life was in danger.
Attorney General Shapiro reported that most tips have been about mental health, not school violence and he re-emphasized the need for additional funding to expand mental health services in schools and “to ensure there is at least one mental health counselor in every school building in PA.” The top five categories of tips received during Safe2Say’s first year were:
- Bullying/Cyber Bullying,
- Cutting/Self-Harm,
- Suicide/Suicide Ideation,
- Drug Use/Distribution/Possession, and
- Depression/Anxiety.
Students and community members can submit tips at www.Safe2Saypa.org; through the Safe2Say Something PA app; or by phone at 844-Safe2Say (844-723-2729). Most of the 40,382 tips were received through the app (32,998), while 6,512 tips came through the website, and 872 tips were submitted by phone to the crisis management center.