School resource officer

School Resource Officers are sworn law enforcement officers who are responsible for providing security and crime prevention services in a school environment. SROs are typically employed by a local police or sheriff's agency and work closely with administrators in an effort to create a safer environment for both students and staff. The responsibilities of SROs are similar to regular police officers in that they have the ability to make arrests, respond to calls for service and document incidents that occur within their jurisdiction. School Resource Officers typically have additional duties to include mentoring and conducting presentations on youth related issues. School resource officers play an integral role in the public school system and have had many positive impacts on the students that they are involved with.

School Resource Officer programs have also been a topic of great debate in the United States during the past few years. Certain groups feel that the presence of Law Enforcement Officers inside schools send the wrong message and it creates an atmosphere that leads to an increase of juveniles being introduced to the Criminal Justice System. There are also many groups who feel that the resources that are used to employee SROs could be used to increase the number of teachers and counselors that are available to help students with other needs. In addition, there are many that argue that educators have been dealing with school issues for many years and they are accustom to maintaing a safe environment. School Resource Officers have become commonplace in American schools but support for their continued work is meeting more resistance from those who feel that schools need to be about education and not police actions.

History

School Resource Officers have been in existence since 1953 when Flint, Michigan provided the first documented SRO to their community. The topic was not broadly discussed in the years to follow but then in 1968, the Fresno, California, Police Department, looked to the School Resource Officer program as a tool to “revitalize its image in the eyes of its youth”. This early adaptation of the program involved placing plain clothed officers in the middle schools and elementary schools to foster the relationship that the department had with the youth, Which is still a goal of the program today. Although Fresno’s program began as non-uniformed officers, it has progressed into what is seen in most communities today which is a uniformed officer, operating a marked police vehicle, and that is responsible for safety and security on the school property. In addition to these responsibilities, Resource Officers must be able to communicate effectively with school officials and be able to address a variety of situation. They must also be willing to communicate with parents, assist with behavior issues and give presentations when necessary. Effectiveness

Concerns

Three key areas regarding the use of School Resource Officers are often mentioned during debates as to the effectiveness of the program. Those areas include crime prevention, the increasing number of juvenile arrests, and the cost of SRO programs compared to other services that could be provided to the students.

• Crime and violence continue to threaten schools and students. In a 2004 survey of school based officers, over 78% stated they had taken a weapon from a student within the past years.

• A good balance of school safety includes addressing both the physical security/safety issues and looking at the psychological safety of all students as well.

• Creating a safe learning environment is a critical component of preparing children to be successful and contributing to society.

• Local police departments and sheriff's offices currently employ an estimated 20,000 full time School Resource Officers.

• School Resource Officers are expected to be more than a law enforcment officer, they are expected to educated students about law-related topics and be a role model to each and every student that they encounter.

• School Resource Officers should be specifically trained to perform their duties in an educational setting and they must understand the special nature of school campuses.

• Budget Reductions have led to cutbacks in many School Resource Officer programs with as many as 24% of the existing programs one particular state experiencing a lose of officers due to budgetary issues.

• Some studies indicate that School Resource Officers make criminal arrests of student for matters that should be handled throught the school disciplinary channels and should not have arisen to the level of criminal charges being filed in Juvenile Court.

Crime Prevention

The first major area is Crime Prevention. The Center for Technology in Education from John Hopkins University Provides a simple job description for SROs and contained within that document they note that ìthe SRO shall develop crime prevention programs and conduct security inspections to deter criminal or delinquent activities. Some may be under the impression that SROs are in place to only protect the students from external matters but the SRO is also responsible for reducing the juvenile crimes that occur on school property. Johns Hopkins University considers this to be a basic requirement for SROs and numerous other articles mimic this concept that School Resource officers prevent crime. However, this is not the only opinion regarding the reduction in crime. Some feel that this increased safety that is associated with the presence of a School Resource Officer can be experienced by all schools if the emphasis is taken away from SRO programs and more efforts put into creating a safe environment through school related programs. An article by the Justice Policy Institute shows that during the time period from 2003-2007 there was an 8.9 percent decrease in the number of SROs in the United States and during that same time frame no increase was noted in the number of reported offenses. It is also believed that incidents that occur in schools that employee SROs are under reported due to the fact that school administrators or teachers will simply contact the SRO when assistance is needed which reduces the number of calls that are received by 911 centers. In another article, James Swift also refers to a report that was prepared by the Justice Policy Institute that indicates that the presence of School Resource Officers does not lead to a reduction in crime.

The presence of School Resource Officers can deter crimes that would otherwise be committed on a school campus. However, there is also data that shows that other administrative measures that are seen in schools that do not have SROs can still contribute to a lower crime rate.

Increasing Arrests of Juveniles

The next area of concern for School Resource Officer programs is the increasing rates of juvenile arrests. In a 2011 article by Amanda Petteruti issued by the Justice Policy Institute, information is presented that indicates that school referrals to the juvenile justice system have increased with the presence of SROs. A high percentage of those referrals were for minor offenses that may have been handled by the administration had an SRO not been present. This concern has attracted attention and some studies indicate that the use of the Juvenile Justice System for minor offences aids in a phenomena known as the " School to Prison Pipeline ". (pg. 13) The American Civil Liberties Union produced a white paper 2009 titled Policing in Schools: Developing A Governance Document for School Resource Officers in K-12 Schools. Within this document, the ACLU suggests that SRO programs should be designed to provide a different response for disciplinary matters as opposed to criminal offenses that occur on school grounds. This recommendation once again helps to ensure that juveniles are not receiving disparate treatment based upon the presence of a law enforcement officer within their school. This argument however, contradicts a Differential Association Theory that was presented by Ryan J. Morimune (2012). Mr. Morimune discusses this theory and how it relates to students, school personnel and School Resource Officers. Mr. Morimune states that criminal behavior is learned from peers and associates. Therefore, " SRO programs are a rational method to preventing an increase in delinquency especially in schools that are more susceptible to crime and violence. " (pg. 28) Once again it is apparent that support exists for maintaining and increasing the number officers in schools but there are also studies that indicate the presence of law enforcement officials has a negative impact on the students.

Cost

One final area of concern is the expenses that are associated with placing School Resource Officers in public schools. In September 2011 the Journal of Police Crisis Negotiations included an article entitled: School Resource Officers in Financial Crisis: Which Programs Get Cut and Why. This article provided some background data from the American Association of School Administrators which reported that " 84% of school districts believed that they are inadequately funded. " (pg. 126) the article went on to tell how a large number of districts were facing reductions in force issues and some had experience five years of budget cuts. Many of the cuts were being made to areas that were not academic in nature which only leaves a few areas where reductions can occur. One of those areas is school safety initiatives. In the SRO-School relationship, if the school is not able to supply the funding, then the costs of the officers typically falls to the local law enforcement agency. When the issue of cost is discussed, the controversy seems to split on a very specific line. Principals typically give great reports when surveyed about the importance of having an SRO present at their school. The National Association of School Resource Officers says " As public-school budgets shrink, communities must not lose sight of the value of SRO programs in their schools. The long-term costs of discontinuing SRO programs far outweigh the savings. " (Pg. 50) These organizations obviously feel that the presence of officer in public schools is a critical piece of the schools operations and should be continued regardless of the costs.

Those on the other side of the discussion do not feel that the funding costs are justified by the service that is provided by the School Resource Officers. Amanda Petteruti (2011) also discusses the issues of budget reductions in her article but she goes on to include that for the price of one School Resource Officer, most districts could hire one teacher and have money left over. The concerns expressed in Education Under Arrest regarding cost show that during times of budget cuts and financial shortfalls that school administrators should examine their operations and see if another service would benefit the school more than having a law enforcement officer on campus. In addition to the expense of the local officer, some look at the national reductions that have been seen in the COPS grants that are administered by the US Department of Justice. Those grants made their first major impact in 2000 when the grants provided money to employee almost 600 School Resource Officers in 289 different communities. The funding allocations peaked in 2002 then have decreased ever since. Some see this as a message that the issue is not a priority for the DOJ and those ideas are reinforced when you see large metropolitan school systems reduce the number of officers that they have on campuses. In addition, Amanda Petteruti (2011) argues that ìSchool resource officers are a relatively new means of maintaining school safety, having only gained real traction in schools in the 1999s. Experienced faculty and staff have been in schools for much longer and are trained to work with students to keep everyone at school safe and to maintain a positive learning environment.

This creates an entirely new debate as to the importance of School Resource Officers versus the importance of educators in a public school setting. A large majority of school districts utilize the SRO program and many depend upon them for many services within the school. SROs will remain a part of the school system but as budget cuts and educational needs change, the SRO program may be affected in the future.

References

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