(a) The State Board of Education, subject to appropriation, is authorized to award competitive grants on an annual basis under a Safe Schools and Healthy Learning Environments Grant Program. The goal of this grant program is to promote school safety and healthy learning environments by providing schools with additional resources to implement restorative interventions and resolution strategies as alternatives to exclusionary discipline, and to address the full range of students' intellectual, social, emotional, physical, psychological, and moral developmental needs.

(b) To receive a grant under this program, a school district must submit with its grant application a plan for implementing evidence-based and promising practices that are aligned with the goal of this program. The application may include proposals to (i) hire additional school support personnel, including, but not limited to, restorative justice practitioners, school psychologists, school social workers, and other mental and behavioral health specialists; (ii) use existing school-based resources, community-based resources, or other experts and practitioners to expand alternatives to exclusionary discipline, mental and behavioral health supports, wraparound services, or drug and alcohol treatment; and (iii) provide training for school staff on trauma-informed approaches to meeting students' developmental needs, addressing the effects of toxic stress, restorative justice approaches, conflict resolution techniques, and the effective utilization of school support personnel and community-based services. For purposes of this subsection, "promising practices" means practices that present, based on preliminary information, potential for becoming evidence-based practices.