Yes

by Bart Ringer

Created on: October 07, 2008   Last Updated: October 11, 2011

During my first two weeks as a School Resource Officer (SRO), 13 students were expelled for bringing weapons or narcotics to school. By the end of the year assaults and thefts were down by 70 percent and I was receiving compliments right and left for having "fixed" the problems. As the flattering words came my way I was reminded of a joke I had once heard:

John Wayne would like to thank the Army, the Navy and the Marine Corps for the small way in which they helped him single-handedly win World War II.

While there is no question that it takes a special type of personality to be able to deal with kids on a law enforcement level and still be able to establish a rapport with them, it's not that simple. I was lucky enough to have both a sympathetic Police Department and a pro-law enforcement school administration to work with.

If you have a good SRO and an anti-law enforcement school administration, things will not come out well. If you have a good SRO and administration but a police department that is unsympathetic and continually tries to micro-manage, things will not turn out well. If you have a lazy SRO who doesn't care much for or about kids, things will not turn out well.

For an SRO to be effective, everything has to come together in the form of a proactive, organized team effort.

When I was first told that I was going to be a temporary replacement for an SRO who had been injured on the job, I immediately went into a snit. I was a street cop, and in my opinion, a good one. I had absolutely no interest whatsoever in going up to the school where the pinko, left-leaning administration would go out of their way to protect the little darlings from the evil cop. I had visions of walking down the halls while the students made oinking sounds and snickered behind my back. The windshield of my patrol car would be covered with loogies and my tires would be slashed. I would be an unwelcome stranger in a strange land. My attitude towards the school, the students and the administration was also fairly typical among my fellow officers.

The Chief told me I was going, and he was the Chief so that was the way it was going to be. I did get him to author a letter saying that the whole deal was temporary and that I could decide after 90 days if I wished to continue with the assignment.

By noon my first day I realized that perhaps I had been a bit too hasty to judge in regards to school duty. While I had worked the streets, about 80 percent of what I was involved in had been negative. At the schools these percentages were reversed, with the majority of my activity being performed on a positive level. My streetside cynicism took a back seat as I realized that, unlike the street, on this level I might actually have a chance to make a difference somewhere down the line.

It was a good thing that I remembered what it was like to be a kid, because the same things that were important to me then were still important to kids today. They wanted to look good, they wanted to be popular, they didn't want to be bullied, and they wanted a safe place to go to school.

Going down the halls during class breaks I knew better than to try to give one of the Gangstas a high five in front of his buddies. But when it was one-on-one in my office, we would get along just fine. I learned to ask leading questions and listen to what the kids had to say. I remembered that when I was a kid we had lived in a different world from that of adults and that hadn't changed. The only way to find out what was going in their world was to gain their confidence and LISTEN to what they had to say.

I just looked back up over all that I have written and apologize for having rambled. As I said above it takes a certain type of personality to be an effective SRO. My original 90 days turned into a four-year stint which I found to be very rewarding. Our schools here are far from perfect, but they are steadily getting better.

From my personal perspective I can truthfully say that my presence did help to reduce problems in our schools, but I didn't do it alone. After all, I'm no John Wayne.

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