With the passage of Senate Bill 11 during the 86th Texas Legislative Session in 2019, Section 115 has been added to Chapter 37 of the Texas Education Code to address threat assessment in public school districts and open-enrollment charter schools. The board of trustees of each school district is required to establish a Safe and Supportive School Program Team which conducts behavioral threat assessments to serve at each campus of the district. A team may serve more than one campus, but each campus must have a team assigned to it. Further, the board must adopt policies and procedures for the teams that are consistent with the model policies and procedures developed by the Texas School Safety Center (TxSSC). These policies and procedures require each team to complete training provided by the TxSSC or a regional education service center (ESC) and report specific information regarding the team’s activities to the Texas Education Agency (TEA).

The superintendent of the district must ensure, to the greatest extent practicable, that the members appointed to each team have expertise in counseling, behavior management, mental health and substance use, classroom instruction, special education, school administration, school safety and security, emergency management, and law enforcement. Additional information regarding specific team membership requirements is provided in the section below. Each established team is required to conduct threat assessments that include assessing and reporting individuals who make threats of violence or exhibit harmful, threatening, or violent behavior and gather and analyze data to determine the level of risk and appropriate interventions.

The school behavioral threat assessment process has continued to expand through recent legislation. The 88th Legislative Session in 2023 added five core responsibilities, and the 89th Legislative Session in 2025 introduced additional team member requirements and notification responsibilities. These mandates, detailed in Texas Education Code 37.115, are summarized below.

Additional Information on Team Membership Requirements

Special Education Representation

When a special education student is the subject of a school behavioral threat assessment, the team conducting the assessment must include a member who has specific knowledge of the student’s disability and the disability’s manifestations. This team member may be an educational diagnostician, a behavior specialist, a special education teacher who instructs or is assigned to the student, a licensed behavior analyst, a licensed clinical or master social worker, or a school psychologist. This requirement strengthens previous language to ensure that the student’s disability and related behaviors are accurately understood during the threat assessment process.

Campus Behavior Coordinator Participation

If a school behavioral threat assessment and Safe and Supportive School Program (SSSP) Team serves more than one campus, the team must also include the person designated as the campus behavior coordinator when serving that particular campus. Each campus behavior coordinator also carries specific reporting responsibilities. They must monitor disciplinary referrals and report a student who engages in conduct involving terroristic threats, unlawfully carrying a weapon, prohibited weapons, exhibiting, using or threatening to use a firearm to the campus’ threat assessment and Safe and Supportive School Program Team. Additionally, campus behavior coordinators must report concerning behaviors or behavioral trends that may indicate a serious risk of violence to self or others. While other staff may assist the campus behavior coordinator, the campus behavior coordinator must personally ensure these duties are carried out accurately.

Training Considerations

As a best practice, special education team members with the disability-specific knowledge, as well as campus behavior coordinators who may be called upon to serve under the conditions described above, should complete the state-mandated school behavioral threat assessment training provided by the Texas School Safety Center or a Regional Education Service Center.

Clear Procedure to Report Concerning Behavior

One responsibility requires each district campus to establish a clear procedure for a student to report concerning behavior exhibited by another student for assessment by the school behavioral threat assessment team or other appropriate school employee.

Training should be provided to students, staff, parents, and community members on the types of concerning and prohibited behaviors that should be reported. Training should also encourage timely reporting, strengthen safety and security, and build trust by ensuring staff are available to respond when a report is received.

Confidentiality of a District Employee

Another responsibility requires the district to protect the identity of a district employee who reports a potential threat to the threat assessment team if the employee desires to keep their identity confidential.

The following is recommended guidance for understanding and implementing this responsibility. First, only the initial reporting district employee has the option to have their identity protected. This confidentiality option is not available to other employees who provide information to the team later during the threat assessment process. Second, an employee who desires to keep their identity confidential has protection under Chapter 552 of the Government Code. Third, the reporting employee needs to understand the law does allow their identity to be disclosed, as necessary, to the threat assessment team, the district, or law enforcement so an investigation can be conducted concerning the potential threat they have reported. Fourth, the reporting employee also needs to understand the district is required, by law, to maintain a record of their identity, even though their identity remains protected under Chapter 552 of the Government Code.

Required Notifications

Parental Notifications

Additional responsibilities require making parental notifications.

Serious Risk of Violence

When the school behavioral threat assessment team determines that a student or other individual poses a serious risk of violence to themselves or others, the team must immediately report this determination to the superintendent. If the individual is a student, the team must also immediately attempt to notify the student’s parent or person standing in parental relation.

Intent to Conduct a Behavioral Threat Assessment

The threat assessment team must notify the parent or guardian of a student before the team begins conducting a threat assessment on a student.

The following is recommended guidance for understanding and implementing this responsibility.

First, address an emergency before anything else is done. Only after the immediate threat to life has been removed should the team notify a parent or guardian of the team’s intent to conduct a behavioral threat assessment on their child. Second, the district should determine how its threat assessment teams are to notify parents or guardians in an expedient and compassionate way in order to begin the threat assessment process as quickly as possible. Third, this mandate directs the team to share with the parent or guardian the team’s intent to conduct a threat assessment on their child. It does not direct the team to ask for parental permission to do so. If a parent or guardian objects to a threat assessment being conducted on their child, inform the parent or guardian the district is required by law to initiate a behavioral threat assessment when it is alerted to a student exhibiting behavior that may pose a risk of harm toward self or others.

The Texas School Safety Center has developed a document titled Sample Script Parental Notification of Intent to Conduct SBTA. This is an optional script that districts can choose to edit and use to notify a parent or guardian of the school’s intent to conduct a behavioral threat assessment on their child. Consult with district leadership on standard messaging, as this is sample guidance.

Opportunity for Parent or Guardian to Participate

The threat assessment team is required to reach out to the parent or guardian of the student of concern and provide them with the opportunity to participate in the threat assessment, either in person or remotely, and provide information regarding the student that might assist the team with conducting the assessment.

The following is recommended guidance for understanding and implementing this responsibility.

First, teams satisfy this responsibility by conducting a parent or guardian interview as they were trained to do in the Texas School Safety Center’s mandated School Behavioral Threat Assessment training. The parent or guardian interview provides part of the information collected during the threat assessment process. Second, please note that the law does not state that the parent or guardian becomes a member of the threat assessment team; rather, it simply requires the team to request the parent or guardian participate by providing information about their child. Parents and guardians cannot be members of the threat assessment team as school districts have a legal responsibility to ensure FERPA confidentiality of students and the original reporting district employee if they have elected to keep their identity protected.

Findings and Conclusions

Texas Education Code 37.115 requires the threat assessment team to provide the findings and conclusions of the behavioral threat assessment to the parent or guardian of the student of concern once completed.

The following is recommended guidance for understanding and implementing this responsibility.

The process to arrive at the threat assessment finding is to collect the relevant pieces of information, ask the 11 Investigative Questions of the information collected, and then ask the two Assessment Questions as taught in the Texas School Safety Center’s School Behavioral Threat Assessment training.

The finding of the result of the assessed threat to share with the parent or guardian is one of three options:

• Option 1: The reported threat or concerning behavior was found to be a misunderstanding or false report and the assessment is being closed with no further action being taken.
• Option 2: The reported threat or concerning behavior could not be verified, and the team will continue to monitor the situation for behaviors indicative of harm to self or others in the community.
• Option 3: The reported threat or concerning behavior was verified as credible, and there is concern their child poses a risk of harmful behavior to self, others, or both. As a result, the parent will be contacted by campus or district staff to collaborate on developing a safety and intervention plan to ensure their child is supported in preventing harmful behaviors.

The conclusion of the behavioral threat assessment is to share any needed interventions the team is recommending be put in place for the well-being of their child and the school community. It may also include district and community resources that may be useful to the parent or guardian in seeking help for their child.

The Texas School Safety Center has developed a document titled, Parental Notification of SBTA Findings and Conclusions for districts. This is an optional letter that districts can edit and use to notify a parent or guardian of the behavioral threat assessment findings and conclusions.

Staff Notifications

A district’s board of trustees must adopt policies that ensure timely notification to staff who may be directly affected by a threat made against a campus, including threats communicated through social media. Administrators or the threat assessment team must notify each member of the teaching staff, including teacher aides, who may be directly affected by the threat.

Notifications must include a statement of the existence and nature of the threat, as well as any pertinent details needed to ensure student and staff safety. These notifications must occur as soon as it is safe and practicable to do so, consistent with district policy.

Retain and Share SBTA Records

Further responsibilities require school behavioral threat assessment information to be retained in school records and shared with a receiving district when a student transfers. Texas Education Code 37.115 requires all materials and information provided to, or produced by, a threat assessment team to be maintained in the student’s record until the student’s 24th birthday.

When a student transfers, Texas Education Code 25.036 requires the student’s district of residence to provide the receiving district with the student’s disciplinary record and any threat assessment records involving the student’s behavior. This requirement remains in place when a parent or guardian is enrolling their child in a Texas public school; under Texas Education Code 25.002, the parent or guardian, or the student’s previous district, must provide the new district with the child’s disciplinary record and any threat assessment records.

Sentinel Requirements

Effective August 1, 2025, all school behavioral threat assessments must be conducted and reported in the Sentinel system using the state-provided threat assessment instrument and the Texas K-12 Behavioral Threat Assessment Manual and Field Guide available in Sentinel.

Any behavioral threat assessments completed before August 1, 2025, must be uploaded into Sentinel for transfer. TEA refers to these as Legacy BTA Cases. Instructions for conducting and reporting new cases, as well as uploading Legacy cases, are available in the Sentinel Behavioral Threat Assessment Dashboard. Sentinel will retain each student’s threat assessment record until the student turns 24 years of age, ensuring compliance with statutory record-retention requirements.

Data Reporting

In accordance with Texas Education Code 37.115(k), school systems are required to report Safe and Supportive School Program (SSSP) team activity, including data on behavioral threat assessments, to the Texas Education Agency (TEA). It is strongly recommended that school systems develop procedures for tracking the submission of campus data to ensure that the mandatory reporting deadline has been met.

Beginning with the 2024-2025 school year, SSSP data reporting will be conducted in Sentinel. Superintendents, Designees, and District BTA Coordinators can find instructions within Sentinel on how to grant campus administrators access to complete the survey. SSSP data reporting questions can be submitted to safeschools@tea.texas.gov.

To assist you in gaining a thorough understanding of these laws and regulations, the Texas School Safety Center has developed the School Safety Law Toolkit. This toolkit provides information on a variety of topics that affect schools, including bullying, emergency management, safety and security audits, dating violence, school-based law enforcement, and substance abuse.