Richmond Public Schools will receive nearly $245,000 in state grant funding to enhance security equipment across its schools.

The Virginia Department of Education announced last week that a $12 million grant will be awarded in dividends to 96 school divisions – a total of 472 schools statewide – to help protect students, staff, faculty and visitors. The school divisions that applied for the competitive grant were judged on a set of criteria by VDOE and the Virginia Department of Criminal Justice Services. Those criteria prioritized schools needing security equipment, schools with relatively high numbers of offenses and school divisions unable to afford security upgrades.

The grant will allow school divisions to purchase various security equipment, including voice and video communication systems, security card access, mass notification systems, and visitor ID badges.

Additionally, funds will go toward surveillance cameras, two-way radios, security vestibules, interior bus cameras, and bus two-way radios. Each school division awarded the grant was eligible to receive up to $250,000.

RPS received $244,519 from VDOE that will be distributed to its 48 schools. Although the school division would not provide further comment, an official confirmed that the grant funds were used for

Raptor upgrades, a visitor management software. The remaining funds were allocated for hardware upgrades.

According to state data from the previous academic year, there have been 5,100 incidents related to bullying, fights and possessing weapons or drugs within RPS. On June 6, 2023, a mass shooting occurred at the Altria Theater, after a Huguenot High School graduation, that left two dead and 17 injured. The school division appointed longtime Richmond Police Department police lieutenant John Beazley as the new director of safety and security in July 2023.