District 158 hires campus resource officers for elementary, middle schools
Two new police resource officers will patrol Huntley Community School District 158's campuses in Algonquin and Lake in the Hills in an effort to improve school safety.
The school board Thursday night approved agreements with the Lake in the Hills and Algonquin police departments to provide a campus resource officer for the district's Reed Road and Square Barn Road campuses, respectively.
Officers will be housed at the middle schools, but also will serve elementary buildings. Similar to Huntley High School's resource officer, they will provide proactive school security, safety education, advice on legal matters, and build positive relationships with students. They will do at-risk assessments, provide additional support in situations where drugs and alcohol might be involved, and monitor general safety of the campuses.
"Educational resources will be a big component of the job," Superintendent Scott Rowe said. "We think this is going to strengthen and bring the departments closer to the schools. A tighter-knit relationship can only benefit our students and our families."
Huntley High School, which has had a school resource officer for more than 18 years, switched from the traditional D.A.R.E. (Drug Abuse Resistance Education) program to Project Lead, created by the Huntley Police Department. It goes beyond dealing with drug and alcohol abuse, focusing more on cyberbullying and online safety.
"We will be implementing that program in the other two campuses," Rowe said. "There will be a lot of educational opportunities for (officers) to provide classroom lessons to the elementary schools, but also to provide a resource ... in terms of parent education on topics, such as vaping, what drugs are trending in the teenage world."
District 158 has a strong relationship with the police departments in all three communities it serves.
"It's just a step to strengthen those relationships and to provide resources right on campus every single day and give our community another layer of comfort," Rowe said.
Rowe said hiring extra officers is not in response to recent problems with cyberbullying and threats at Marlowe Middle School in Lake in the Hills, which serves more than 1,400 students in sixth through eighth grades from the Huntley and Lake in the Hills area.
"This has been a conversation that we've had ongoing for a couple of years," Rowe said. "What we were dealing with over the last two years at Marlowe ... there would have been a more immediate response had (an officer) been in place there."
Cyberbullying is something all schools are battling.
"There is a social emotional component to this. Students feel a sense of safety when an officer is around," said Rowe adding, bonding with the officers will make students more comfortable asking for help.