K-12 educators often face the dilemma of how to respond to a student who makes a threatening statement. They must decide whether the threat is credible and the student poses a real danger, as well as how to respond to keep everyone safe. In such situations, a team of professionals often does a "safety assessment" to learn more about this student and evaluate how credible the threat is. The authors describe an approach many schools use for such an assessment (The Virginia Student Model for Threat Assessment Guidelines). Drawing on research with students who have undergone a safety assessment (and their families), they recommend ways to do the assessment that will keep the school safe and address the underlying problems of the student making the threat.