Report page 4

In 2024, the U.S. Secret Service’s National Threat Assessment Center (NTAC) tasked the Homeland Security Operational Analysis Center (HSOAC) with conducting a study to advance the field’s understanding of behavioral threat assessment and management practices in K–12 schools.

In this co-branded HSOAC-NTAC report, we take a comprehensive look at how K–12 schools are implementing and using behavioral threat assessment and management programs as part of their violence prevention efforts, using data from a survey administered to a nationally representative sample of 1,746 school leaders.

The primary audiences for this research include school- and district-level administrators, school safety partners, and community-based organizations (such as local law enforcement).

School-related associations and stakeholder groups may also be interested in this report.

This research was sponsored by the U.S. Secret Service and conducted in the Infrastructure, Immigration, & Security Operations Program of the RAND Homeland Security Research Division (HSRD), which operates the Homeland Security Operational Analysis Center (HSOAC).

The American Educator Panels (AEP) are nationally representative samples of teachers, school leaders, and K–12 public school districts across the country.

The panels are a proud member of the American Association for Public Opinion Research’s Transparency Initiative.

The Homeland Security Act of 2002 (Public Law 107-296, § 305, as codified at 6 U.S.C. § 185) authorizes the Secretary of Homeland Security, acting through the Under Secretary for Science and Technology, to establish one or more federally funded research and development centers (FFRDCs) to provide independent analysis of homeland security issues.

RAND operates the Homeland Security Operational Analysis Center (HSOAC) as an FFRDC for the U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS) under contract 70RSAT22D00000001.

The HSOAC FFRDC provides the government with independent and objective analyses and advice in core areas important to the department in support of policy development, decisionmaking, alternative approaches, and new ideas on issues of significance.

HSOAC also works with and supports other federal, state, local, tribal, and public- and private-sector organizations that make up the homeland security enterprise.

HSOAC’s research is undertaken by mutual consent with DHS and organized as a set of discrete tasks.

This report presents the results of research and analysis conducted under 70US0924F1DHS2132, “Behavioral Threat Assessment and Management Implementation Research.”

The results presented in this report do not necessarily reflect official DHS opinion or policy.

For more information on this publication, see www.rand.org/t/RRA3658-1.

The National Threat Assessment Center (NTAC) was established as a component of the U.S. Secret Service in 1998 to provide research and guidance in direct support of the Secret Service’s protective mission and to others with public safety responsibilities.

Through the Presidential Threat Protection Act of 2000, Congress formally authorized NTAC to conduct research on threat assessment and various types of targeted violence;

For more information about any one of the survey panels, visit www.rand.org/aep.

If you are interested in using AEP data for your own surveys or analysis or in reading other publications related to the AEP, please email aep@rand.org or visit www.rand.org/aep.

For more information on HSRD, see www.rand.org/hsrd.