A suicide awareness and prevention policy was adopted by the Eastern Pulaski School Board Monday. Among other things, it requires all school employees to undergo training on how recognize the risk factors and how to respond. For students, educational materials are to be integrated into their health classes. “That’s something that we’ll be talking about in pretty good detail in coming months,” Superintendent Dan Foster said, “with Rachel’s Challenge and some things coming down the pipe, plus some training that we have to do through the state legislature.”
Foster explained that school corporations are required to have a suicide prevention policy in place. The policy also calls for the appointments of suicide prevention coordinators for each school, as well as the corporation as a whole, along with the establishment of a crisis team.
It was one of two new policies approved by the Eastern Pulaski School Board Monday. The other had to do with student religious civil liberties.
Foster explained that policy is not required, but it is recommended by the Indiana School Boards Association. “This is basically treating everyone the same,” he said. “If you allow one religious organization to use the facilities for this meeting, then you cannot discriminate against another because you don’t follow their beliefs. It’s just everybody’s playing the same rules.”
The policy also specifies to what extent religious content may be discussed in the classroom. Additionally, it says that students may express their religious beliefs, and outlines the contexts in which that is allowed.
