PREPaRE is an evidence-based training curriculum aimed to equip members of multidisciplinary school crisis teams and school-based mental health professionals to engage in comprehensive school crisis prevention and intervention. The program’s acronym stands for: Prevent/Prepare for psychological trauma; Reaffirm physical health, security, and safety; Evaluate psychological trauma; Provide interventions (and) Respond to psychological needs; and Examine the effectiveness of prevention and intervention efforts. PREPaRE consists of two workshops––Workshop 1: Comprehensive School Safety Planning: Prevention Through Recovery (3rd ed.; Reeves et al., 2019) and Workshop 2: Mental Health Crisis Interventions: Responding to an Acute Traumatic Stressor in Schools (3rd ed.; Brock & Reeves, 2019). A PREPaRE Training of Trainer (ToT) workshop corresponds to each of the two “core” workshops, streamlining the implementation process as PREPaRE-trained instructors can then lead workshops in their region. Although PREPaRE is not specifically a suicide prevention program, it aims to help school-based professionals prevent and respond to a range of school crises, including suicide, in ways that align with research and best practices.

The two core workshops complement each other, but each is tailored to different groups of professionals. Workshop 1 is geared toward any school professional or community provider/agency who serves on multi-disciplinary crisis team and/or is involved in establishing and promoting school safety (e.g., administrators, school psychologists, school counselors, school social workers, school resource officers, nurses, general and special education teachers, school safety specialists, front office staff, community providers and agencies, etc.). Workshop 2 is most appropriate for school-employed mental health professionals (school psychologists, counselors, social workers and nurses), community providers who provide crisis intervention and recovery services, as well as administrators and other school staff members who need information on providing the psychological first aid technique reviewed in this workshop.

PREPaRE first builds a foundation for crisis intervention work by defining key term and understanding what it is that makes crises traumatic. Then it reviews variables that will affect the degree to which individuals are traumatized. Finally, it reviews a range of crisis interventions by making use of a multi-tiered system of support.