New safety chief gets to work in Dist. 300

Gary Chester's first day as Community Unit District 300's safety officer was also the day a Carpentersville elementary school was placed on alert because of a bomb threat.

Since then, Chester, District 300's first safety chief, has received a quick lesson in the challenges facing the school district.

During the month after Chester started, a student was assaulted in a Dundee-Crown High School stairwell, a gang-related fight broke out at Jacobs High School and a man armed with a gun was arrested outside Dundee-Crown.

Chester has hit the ground running, rolling out a safety tip line and implementing safety improvements at Dundee-Crown.

The tip line started taking calls Oct. 27. So far, it's only received one message - about a busing issue.

But Chester is hoping the line will become a valuable source of information about drugs, violence and weapons in District 300 schools.

"It's one more means of trying to provide an outlet for students to keep their schools safe," he said.

Chester implemented a safety tip line for schools when he was police and fire chief in Coldwater, Mich. At first, the line received many bogus tips but eventually proved a reliable source of information on drugs in the district, Chester said.

Jacobs Principal Michael Bregy said the Algonquin high school had a Web-based tip line before the districtwide tip line was implemented.

"We act on every tip that we receive," Bregy said. "It has proved to be extremely valuable for drugs and with gang activity."

Chester also is conducting safety assessments at each of the district's three high schools.

After last month's assault on a student in a Dundee-Crown stairwell, parents at the Carpentersville high school demanded action on school safety at a recent school board meeting.

"Many parents are fearful," Algonquin resident and Dundee-Crown parent Monica O'Neill said. "Our children should not be fearful of attending after-school activities for fear of being harmed."

Since the incident, the district has acted on Chester's recommendations, installing brighter lights, enhancing fencing around the school, moving student parking and trimming landscaping.

The changes were met with applause when Chester announced the measures at a recent board meeting.

"We were all pretty happy the way things ended up after that meeting," O'Neill said.

Chester also has recommended the school install as many as 12 cameras inside and outside the building - in addition to the 100 cameras installed last year.

Dundee-Crown Principal Lynn McCarthy said the cameras have helped deter crime and identify students involved in drugs and violence.

"It's been instrumental in helping us stop things before they start," McCarthy said.

Chester's top priorities are creating crisis management plans for each District 300 school, coordinating emergency response with local authorities and training district staff in violence prevention.

"My main concern is that the staff is trained," Chester said. "Eventually, we'd like to train all the staff in gang awareness."