April 21, 2026 – HOOVER, Ala. – Presenters will focus on preventing and responding to school violence, including shootings, during the 36th annual National School Safety Conference, June 28 to July 2, in Reno, Nevada. The National Association of School Resource Officers hosts the conference.
The conference schedule includes more than 65 informational breakout sessions on a wide variety of important topics, including:
- The Meme-to-Murder Pipeline: How Internet Subcultures Breed the Next Attackers, by a threat analyst in the Anti-Defamation League Center on Extremism (COE) who has been involved in COE’s threat monitoring capabilities. This presentation will explore how digital spaces can normalize violence, foster echo chambers and radicalize youth toward carrying out targeted attacks. It will include detailed case studies of two recent school shooters.
- Critical Law Enforcement Lessons-Learned from Active Shooter Attacks, by Ed Monk, Last Resort Training & Consulting. This presentation will demonstrate 20 law enforcement lessons learned from successes and failures in responding to active shooter attacks. It is designed to improve the law enforcement officer's preparation to stop this threat.
- Shootings and K-12 Special Events, by Lt. Jeremy Barnes, Utah Department of Public Safety. Barnes will discuss the prevalence of shootings at K-12 special events such as high school football games. For example, on March 31, 2026, a 13-year-old student allegedly shot and killed another student at a track meet in Missouri. Barnes will explore the inconsistency of security measures at the K-12 level and what can be done to improve safety at K-12 special events.
- Behavioral Threat Assessment: A Framework to Prevent Targeted Violence, by Arlene Macias, domestic security strategist, U.S. Secret Service National Threat Assessment Center (NTAC). This presentation will highlight past incidents and relevant implications and recommendations from NTAC's latest research on targeted school violence and interrupted school plots in the United States. It will help communities intervene with individuals who exhibit concerning or threatening behaviors to reduce the likelihood of a violent outcome.
- Preventing Violence: What’s Possible—and What Works, by Rebecca Redmer, co-founder of the Violence Prevention Initiative. This interactive workshop equips school resource officers and other school safety professionals with practical, prevention-focused communication tools designed to reduce conflict and strengthen trust within school communities. Grounded in emotional intelligence, self-awareness, and situational awareness, the presentation addresses how miscommunication and disconnection often escalate into behavioral incidents or violence in school settings.
- Digital Radicalization and Emerging Threats in Your Schools: What SROs and School Leaders Need to Know, by Steven MacDonald, executive director, Safer Schools Together. This presentation will examine AI-generated deep-fake imagery, weapon-related content and digital manipulation. It will also review tools to detect AI material, address privacy violations and respond within a school-based threat assessment framework. This session delivers actionable strategies to identify digital leakage, intervene early, and strengthen protective factors before digital influence translates into offline harm.
- Tracking School Swatters and Shooters Through Leakage and Holding Them Accountable, by Rich Wistocki, president, Be Sure Law Enforcement Cyber Training. This presentation will show SROs, school administrators and IT professionals a step-by-step process to follow when a false report of active violence or a communicated threat of future violence targets a school. The tools presented will help schools identify perpetrators within two hours, enabling schools to act quickly and proactively to reduce the impact of hoaxes and the threat of school shootings and other forms of violence.
A complete, continuously updated schedule of sessions and their descriptions is available on NASRO’s website.
In addition to the breakout sessions described above, the conference will offer several compelling general sessions for all attendees, including “Threat and Suicide Risk Assessment and How SROs and School Mental Health Professionals Can Collaborate,” “Understanding the Role of AI: Digital Risks and Threat Assessment” and “School Liability 2026: The Changing of the Guard and Failure to Train Liability.”
In 2025, 2,374 people attended the NASRO National School Safety Conference in Grapevine, Texas. Based on early registration, NASRO anticipates another highly attended conference that will likely result in a sellout. In addition to educational presentations, the event will offer attendees an opportunity to receive in-service training; visit an exhibit hall with the latest in products, technologies and innovations; and interact with school resource officers, school administrators, sheriffs and chiefs of police from throughout the country and world.
More information about the conference, including a complete agenda and online registration, is available at www.nasro.org/conference/.
Complimentary credentials are available to working journalists covering the conference. NASRO requests that journalists who wish to attend inform their media contact (below) as soon as possible.
About NASRO
NASRO is a nonprofit organization for school-based law enforcement officers, school administrators and school security/safety professionals working as partners to protect students, school faculty and staff, and the schools they attend. NASRO’s national offices are in Hoover, Alabama. The organization was established in 1991. For more information, visit www.nasro.org.
Media Contact:
Katlin Candelaria
[email protected]
(205) 739-6060