After the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001, the President signed the Aviation and Transportation Security Act (ATSA) into law on November 19, 2001, with the primary goal of strengthening the security of the nation’s aviation system. ATSA created TSA as the agency responsible for securing all modes of transportation, including aviation. The President also issued the National Strategy for Homeland Security in July 2002. The National Strategy for Homeland Security sets forth a plan to strengthen homeland security through the cooperation of federal, state, local, and private-sector organizations in various areas. The National Strategy for Homeland Security aligns and focuses homeland security functions into six critical mission areas: (1) intelligence and warning, (2) border and transportation security, (3) domestic counterterrorism, (4) protecting critical infrastructures and key assets, (5) defending against catastrophic threats, and (6) emergency preparedness and response. A theme of the national strategy is that homeland security is a shared responsibility among these stakeholders, not solely the responsibility of the federal government. In the case of flight and cabin crew member security training, air carriers and TSA both play an important role. Air carriers are responsible for developing and delivering security training programs for their crew members. TSA (and previously FAA) is responsible for developing the guidance and standards that air carriers are to use to design and deliver their security training and for monitoring air carriers’ flight and cabin crew member security training programs for compliance with the guidance and standards. If TSA finds an air carrier to be noncompliant with developing and conducting the required flight and cabin crew member security training, TSA has a range of actions it can take, including imposing fines, and in extreme circumstances, force the air carrier to shut down its operations. The Bureau of Transportation Statistics reported that 105 domestic passenger air carriers were operating in the United States in 2004. Of the 105 air carriers, 12 (11 percent) are major air carriers that carried over 76 percent of the passengers in 2004. With a few exceptions for small aircraft, every commercial flight in the United States has at least two flight crew members and one cabin crew member onboard. These crew members are viewed as the last line of defense in what TSA describes as its layered security system, which includes perimeter security (e.g., airport security fencing), 100 percent passenger and checked baggage screening, hardened flight deck doors, armed federal air marshals, and armed pilots. Figure 1 provides the number of domestic air carriers by carrier group (major, national, and regional) and the percentage of passengers flown domestically by carrier group during fiscal year 2004. Federal guidance for air carriers to use to develop their flight and cabin crew security training programs has been in place for over 20 years. FAA developed the crew member security training guidance, referred to as Common Strategy I, in the early 1980’s in response to numerous hijacking incidents in the late 1970’s. Common Strategy I generally instructed air carriers to develop training programs that called for flight and cabin crew members to cooperate with threatening passengers or hijackers and slow compliance with their demands. Based on this guidance, FAA also developed corresponding security training standards that set forth the requirements for flight and cabin crew member security training. Air carriers were required to incorporate the guidance and standards into their security training programs. FAA principal security inspectors and principal operations inspectors were responsible for monitoring air carriers’ compliance with the security training standards. The nature of the terrorist attacks on September 11, 2001, however, demonstrated that the philosophy of Common Strategy I—to cooperate with hijackers—was flawed as it presumed that hijackers would not use aircraft as weapons of mass destruction. Following the events of September 11, 2001, section 107 of ATSA required FAA, in consultation with TSA and other stakeholders, to develop detailed guidance for flight and cabin crew security training programs within 60 days after the enactment of the act. FAA developed and issued security training guidance, in accordance with the requirements of ATSA, on January 19, 2002. In February 2002, TSA assumed responsibility for monitoring air carriers’ security training for United States passenger air carriers and the air carrier security inspections function was transferred from FAA to TSA. Following the enactment of ATSA, the President signed into law two acts that amended the flight and cabin crew training requirements codified at title 49 of the U.S. Code, section 44918—the Homeland Security Act of 2002 and Vision 100. The Homeland Security Act, enacted on November 25, 2002, amended the law by, among other things, mandating that, if TSA updated training guidance, it must issue a rule to include elements of self- defense in the training programs. Vision 100, subsequently enacted on December 12, 2003, amended the flight and cabin crew security training law in its entirety to require that air carriers providing scheduled passenger air transportation carry out a training program that addresses the 10 elements listed in table 1; TSA approve the air carrier’s training programs; TSA, in consultation with FAA, monitor air carrier training programs and periodically review an air carrier’s training program to ensure the program is adequately preparing crew members for potential threat conditions; TSA, in consultation with FAA, order air carriers to modify training programs to reflect new or different security threats; and TSA develop and provide an advanced voluntary self-defense training program to provide both classroom and effective hands-on training in, at least, the six training elements listed in table 2. Table 1 lists the minimum training elements required by law, as enacted by ATSA and as amended by Vision 100, for basic crew member security training. Table 2 lists the training elements that TSA must include in an advanced voluntary self-defense training program for flight and cabin crew members under the law, as amended by Vision 100. Over the years, our work on best practices in training has found that generally high-performing organizations follow certain key steps in developing and measuring the effectiveness of training programs. These steps include planning—developing a strategic approach that establishes priorities and leverages investments in training to achieve agency results and identify the competencies—commonly referred to as knowledge, skills, abilities, and behaviors—needed to achieve organizational missions and goals, and measure the extent to which their employees possess these competencies; design and development—identifying specific initiatives that the agency will use, along with other strategies, to include individual and organizational performance; implementation—ensuring effective and efficient delivery of training opportunities in an environment that supports learning and change; and evaluation—assessing the extent to which training efforts contribute to improved performance and results. Building on the legislatively mandated guidance developed by FAA and the corresponding standards, TSA enhanced crew member security training guidance and standards with input from stakeholders in accordance with the law, as amended by Vision 100. TSA policy and training officials stated that they revised the guidance and standards for two main reasons. First, the law required that air carriers include additional training elements in their basic crew member security training programs to prepare flight and cabin crew members for potential threat conditions. Second, TSA determined that the guidance and standards needed to be better organized and to more clearly define security training elements, in part due to feedback from air carriers, flight and cabin crew member labor organizations, and associations representing air carriers. For example, stakeholders we interviewed and our own review found that the organization of the previous security training standards was difficult to follow in that several requirements were addressed in multiple sections of the document rather than focused in a single section. During the summer of 2003 and May 2004, TSA established two internal working groups comprised of representatives of its policy, training, regulatory, and/or legal offices. One working group was responsible for revising the security training guidance, and the other working group was responsible for revising the corresponding security training standards—the standards from which air carriers must train their flight and cabin crew members. TSA officials stated that these working groups determined the reasonableness and appropriateness of the security training elements contained in the existing guidance and standards in place at that time and what additional training elements were needed. During the development of the revised guidance and standards, TSA provided external stakeholders with two opportunities to provide comments. In July 2004, the first comment period, TSA convened a meeting of external stakeholders to present an overview of the draft revised guidance and standards and to provide copies of the documents for their review and comment. TSA initially requested that stakeholders provide comments on the draft revised guidance and standards within 2 weeks. However, in response to stakeholder concerns about the short comment period, TSA extended the comment period for an additional 2 weeks. After consolidating all stakeholder comments, TSA’s internal working group reviewed the comments to determine which to incorporate in the guidance and standards. In August 2004, the second comment period, TSA convened additional meetings with external stakeholders— one meeting with air carrier associations and another with crew member labor organizations—to review each of the stakeholders’ comments and to discuss changes made to the revised guidance and standards in response to these comments. In September 2004, TSA provided the stakeholders with a 30-day comment period on the revised guidance and standards. After receiving comments and determining which of the suggested changes to include in the revised guidance and standards, TSA issued the finalized guidance and standards to air carriers on January 3, 2005. Stakeholders we interviewed and our own analysis of revisions made to the guidance and standards generally found the revised guidance and standards to be better organized and to provide some additional clarity on security training requirements for crew members. For example, we found that the previous standards only implicitly addressed the requirement for training on the psychology of terrorists and addressed it in multiple sections in the document. In contrast, the revised standards organized information on this requirement in a single section and clearly identified the requirement as “psychology of terrorists.” Additionally, the previous guidance did not define what constitutes life-threatening behavior, whereas the revised guidance provides both a definition of this behavior and examples.