Sunday, May 20, 2007

School Resource Officers Around the Valley

There was an article in the Morning Call today (read it here) relevant to the conversation here at the beginning of the month (read it here) about school security and having a police presence in the buildings.

As I understand it, Nazareth has a resource officer in the MS and the article discusses the value of having a resource officer (or more than one, or a security team comprised of former officers) to a school and surrounding community. It notes how an officer can get tips on issues within and taking place outside the school building itself.

Typically, however, cost becomes the reason to abandon the resource officer position. Recently Nazareth has undergone many construction projects to redesign school entranceways, install surveillance equipment, and has had lock downs this year at one school (to my knowledge) and other 'typical' security issues at other ones.

It would seem that this investment should be coordinated and directed by a trained security professional and that Nazareth ought to consider having a full-time resource officer at the HS in addition to the one at the MS. In the previous post I also noted the need to have a summit of NASD area law enforcement and school officials.

Maybe the Morning Call article and Monday's meeting will at least bring the issue to the attention of the NASD Board and Administration.

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