Education
What School Safety Officers Want You to Know
The people in charge of your child’s safety at school might be guidance counselors, guards or police officers. Here’s what they say about their role in protecting students. By Ann L. Rappoport, PhD Part of the back-to-school tradition is meeting your child’s new teacher or principal. But many parents may not know the various employees who help keep their children safe at school, let alone what they do. So MetroKids reached out to a number of school districts in Delaware, New Jersey and Pennsylvania, and here is what local experts want parents to understand.
School safety is a team effort
Different personnel look out for different aspects of student safety. Some, such as guidance counselors, are school employees. In some cases, civilian contractors, such as guards or consultants, are hired by school districts. Increasingly, school districts work with school resource officers (SROs). In New Jersey, SROs are police officers who serve a school district through an agreement with the police department. In Delaware, SROs are state police or constables. SROs offer districts multiple support services, including educational resources for staff and students. Having an SRO isn’t a stigma and doesn’t mean that a school is bad, emphasizes Pat Kissane, deputy chief of the Fort Lee, NJ police department and head of the New Jersey Association of School Resource Officers. Kissane says SROs receive special training, including how to protect students’ rights.
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The national Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act (FERPA) provides guidelines to protect student records and outlines how they can be shared. It’s just one of the many regulations — federal, state and local — that govern policies that affect school security. Arming teachers or anyone in schools other than on-duty police officers worries some law-enforcement professionals. Part of their concern is whether those people are properly trained in the use of weapons and protocols. Also, in the event of a shooting, it may not be clear to first responders who are the perpetrators and who are the “good guys.”
A seat at the (lunch) table
State troopers and constables play a “preventive role” in schools, says Alex Nowell, public safety officer for Red Clay Consolidated School District in Delaware. They work on de-escalating and resolving tensions. “We’re not there to arrest; we’re there to assist staff. Safety is paramount.” Part of that role is “an open-door policy of communication,” Nowell explains. Constables often sit at the lunch table with students and become mentors to students. He’s known students to speak candidly to security officers about specific struggles they’re having or about a situation at home, so officers become integral parts of the students’ support systems. It’s not unusual for those bonds
Tips for parents Our experts had these suggestions for parents and guardians: • Attend parent-empowerment and training programs sponsored by schools to learn how to listen and talk with your kids. Learn non-violent strategies for de-escalating conflict and tension. • Communicate with your kids. Know what they’re into. Keep a dialogue going. Read the newspapers and pay attention to contemporary issues; raise hypotheticals for discussion. • Monitor your kids’ social media activities. Problems can accelerate and spread quickly through social media and can intensify and carry over to school. Seek help from professionals if you don’t know what to do. • Watch for warning signs that your child needs help — changes in demeanor, withdrawing from friends or family, acting out, depression, troublesome writing, failing in school. • Determine in advance where to re-unite with family members if an incident requires either evacuation or dislocation and remind your children of the plan. Rushing to school can create more problems than it solves. • Don’t hesitate to report concerns or seek professional assistance to support your child’s safety. to continue after students graduate, Nowell says. There are kids in personal crisis on a daily basis, Kissane notes. When SROs develop relationships and trust in a school, they’re able to directly help those youngsters. Whether the problem is abuse, sexting, money or suicidal thoughts, Kissane says SROs listen and
AUGUST 2018