THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1994, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Thursday, August 11, 1994 TAG: 9408100160
SECTION: SUFFOLK SUN PAGE: 17 EDITION: FINAL
TYPE: COVER STORY
BACK TO SCHOOL
SOURCE: BY VANEE VINES, STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: SUFFOLK LENGTH: Medium: 71 lines
There may be some unfamiliar faces at the city's high schools this fall but two newcomers certainly won't be freshmen.
Superintendent Beverly B. Cox III plans to place a police officer in each of the district's two high schools to deter violence. No city school now uses security officers of any sort.
But educators across Hampton Roads increasingly are relying on those in uniform to monitor schools and help protect them from violence that doesn't stop at the schoolhouse door. Portsmouth, for example, placed an armed juvenile detective in each of its high schools last year.
``It's for additional security at the high schools,'' Cox said of his plan. ``That's it.''
Three city police officers already work in schools through a drug-awareness education program, a police spokesman said. However, the two additional officers - one per school - will be at Lakeland and Nansemond River high schools for security purposes.
Student reaction was mixed, but most embraced the idea.
``I don't think things are that bad, and one officer can't be everywhere at once, anyway,'' said Matthew Irby, a 1994 Lakeland graduate. ``But I guess having that person there would make people think twice about trying to do something.''
Nekita Swain, who will begin her sophomore year at Nansemond River this fall, said the action was long overdue.
``I think it will be safer because you never know what strangers may try to come in the school off the street or what would be on some people's minds in school,'' said 14-year-old Swain, who witnessed both a fight at her lunch table and what she described as a cafeteria brawl during the past school year.
Lisa Pearce, a 16-year-old Lakeland student, said disciplinary problems in the district's high schools are no worse than those anywhere else.
Even so, there are signs that problems are escalating.
The number of high school students expelled for violating the district's weapons policy, for example, increased from four during 1991-92 to 18 during the past school year. Students were found with weapons such as knives, box cutters, pellet guns and scissors. No real guns were discovered.
Students and parents were alarmed earlier this year by a much-talked-about incident at Nansemond River in which one student tried to attack a classmate with a pair of scissors.
A school-based police officer, said School Board member William L. Whitley, ``would give administrators, teachers, students and parents a little feeling of security.''
Where all of the money to cover the officers' salaries will come from is still unclear.
The district set aside $34,000 in the current budget for one officer's salary. School officials hoped that the police department would free up another officer and continue to pay that person from the police department's budget.
Police Chief Gilbert Jackson said he's still considering the idea. The department received money for two new officers this fiscal year. Both were assigned to the communications department, however.
Cox said the district would squeeze money from other areas, if necessary, to employ officers at the two schools.
``I do plan to do it,'' he said. ``It's definitely still on the table.''
KEYWORDS: SUFFOLK SCHOOLS SUFFOLK POLICE DEPARTMENT
by CNB