On the one year anniversary of the Safe2Say program, Attorney General Josh Shapiro announced Pennsylvania’s anonymous reporting system for schools, students and community members, “Safe2Say Something PA” has reached over 40,000 tips from across the Commonwealth.

“Safe2Say Something PA empowers students, teachers, and administrators to anonymously report potentially unsafe activities in schools,” Shapiro said. “In its first year of operation, Safe2Say received 40,382 tips, including 6,847 that we categorized as ‘life-safety,’ meaning a life was somehow in danger.

“None of this would have been possible without the students who have trusted us and participated, the analysts in the crisis management center who work tirelessly to handle tips and keep people safe, and nearly every school in Pennsylvania that has worked with us and gotten the word out about a program that seeks to strengthen public safety.”

Safe2Say Something was created following the governor’s approval of Act 44 in 2018. The anonymous reporting system came online on Jan. 14, 2019.

Pennsylvania was the first to deploy Safe2Say statewide and to train students and staff in all of the commonwealth’s 500 public school districts, including private, charter, and parochial schools.

Attorney General Shapiro said most of the tips have been about mental health, not school violence as many had originally expected.

“As I traveled across Pennsylvania to talk to students about Safe2Say, they weren’t peppering me with questions on school shooting drills or metal detectors. They were talking about fellow students who seemed depressed, came to school without lunch, and chronic online bullying,” Shapiro said.