• By Terrence Wilson, J.D.• May 7, 2025 • 
In response to the tragic shooting at Apalachee High School in Barrow County in September 2024, Speaker of the House Jon Burns and Barrow County Rep. Holt Persinger introduced House Bill 268, a wide-ranging school safety bill.
The measure was passed this past legislative session in Georgia. While it includes some positive steps toward supporting students, it also raises serious concerns about how students may be treated.
HB 268 includes new rules for how schools handle safety and discipline. Some are good for students and focus on prevention and support:
- Suicide and Violence Prevention Training: Students in sixth grade and up will now receive an hour of suicide prevention and youth violence training each year.
- Positive Behavioral Support: High-need schools must use positive behavior programs (PBIS), which reduce discipline problems and improve school climate.
- Creation of the “Qualified Student Advocacy Specialist”: A new position will be created and funded to focus on student mental health.
Mikayla Arciaga, M.A.Ed., IDRA Georgia Advocacy Director, and Sophie Biggs, a student mentored by IDRA, presented testimony on an early version of this legislation.
However, parts of the law may harm students.
- Mobile Panic Alert Systems: While these may help in emergencies, they are expensive and could take money away from prevention programs.
- Sharing Discipline Records: When students transfer schools, their past discipline records will precede them, which may lead to labeling and stigma.
- Threat Assessment Plans: Every school must create a plan to determine whether students pose a threat to school safety, but this could lead to unfairly labeling kids for non-threatening behaviors.
- Law Enforcement Reports: Police must now inform schools and parents in writing when a student is involved in a serious threat incident near a school. This helps keep parents informed, but labeling remains a concern.
- Harsh Penalties for “Terroristic” Threats and Acts: Kids as young as 13 can be tried as adults for making “terroristic acts” against schools (formerly in SB 61) and terroristic threats have an increased penalty.
Mikayla Arciaga, M.A.Ed., and Makiah Lyons, JD, presented testimony on SB 61 while. it was active, with special attention to the “terroristic” threats and acts language that was later added into HB 268.
What’s Not in the Law: Thanks to push back from Georgia parents and advocacy groups, the final bill does not include a statewide database to track students as “threats.” This is a win for student privacy and racial equity.
Terrence Wilson, J.D., is IDRA’s regional policy and community engagement director. Comments and questions may be directed to him via email at terrence.wilson@idra.org.
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