All Texas public school administrators will receive active shooter training provided by the Advanced Law Enforcement Rapid Response Training (ALERRT) Center at the request of Governor Greg Abbott.
Texas State University’s ALERRT has developed first-responder strategies and training for administrators and school-based law enforcement personnel across the state. ALERRT officials said the program is “the best research-based active shooter response training in the nation.”
“We sadly recognize we cannot do anything to bring back the precious lives that were taken; however, we must do everything in our power to prevent the same tragic ending from happening again,” Abbott wrote in a letter to Pete Blair, the ALERRT Center’s executive director, on Monday.
In his letter, Abbott ordered ALERRT to “provide a debrief of the Uvalde school shooting and other relevant situations to school administrators, law enforcement personnel, and other decision-makers charged with school safety in all [Texas] public schools” and “deploy [ALERRT’s] nationally recognized active shooter training to all Texas school districts, prioritizing school-based law enforcement.”
“ALERRT training is provided by veteran first responders with proven experience in active attack response,” per a press release issued by the governor’s office. “The program includes 16 hours of training in team movement, room entry techniques, approach and breaching the crisis, shooting and moving, as well as post engagement priorities of work.”
Abbott’s directive is the latest in a series of executive actions in response to the Uvalde shooting, which killed 19 students and two teachers.
The governor issued a disaster declaration for Uvalde on May 31, which suspended any regulations that would have hindered any reallocation of state and local resources to the city after the shooting.
A day later, Abbott ordered the Texas School Safety Center and the Texas Education Agency to develop and conduct “random intruder detection audits” of all public-school campuses.
He also directed Lieutenant Governor Dan Patrick and Texas House Speaker Dade Phelan to convene special legislative committees to study school safety and mass violence “so that meaningful action can be made.”
