Clear Creek Amana to add school resource officer to middle, high school campuses

TIFFIN — A school resource officer could be on site at Clear Creek Amana’s middle and high school in a one-year pilot program beginning this fall in partnership with the Johnson County Sheriff’s Office.

The Clear Creek Amana school board Wednesday unanimously approved a 28E Agreement between the district and sheriff’s office for a full-time deputy who would primarily serve the secondary school buildings in Tiffin.

The agreement will go to the Johnson County Board of Supervisors for consideration next month. If approved, Clear Creek Amana would be the first school district in Johnson County to have a law enforcement officer stationed in its schools, Superintendent Aaron Davidson said.

“We don’t take that lightly,” Davidson said. “If this is something that can better our school environment and provide more positive outcomes for students, it’s worth a shot. We don’t want to do that in a way that could potentially harm any students and staff.”

Those positive outcomes could be everyday interactions between students and the school resource officer that “helps students see law enforcement differently than what they’ve seen in the past,” Davidson said.

Davidson, who is in his first year as superintendent of the Clear Creek Amana district, previously worked in Fort Dodge and was principal of a middle school where a school resource officer was present.

He said he witnessed the officer “fundamentally change the dynamic of the building” and become a “consistent, trusted presence in our hallways, classrooms and common areas.”

“Students got to know the officer as a person first, not just as an officer responding to a crisis. To me, informal, everyday interaction builds rapport and helps students see an SRO as their ally,” Davidson said.

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Davidson said Clear Creek Amana schools “are safe.”

“We are not introducing an SRO to the middle and high school buildings because we feel there’s a safety issue. Is there a safety component? Of course because you would have a deputy in the buildings. It gives people peace of mind,” he said.

Students, staff and families who will be at the middle and high school next year were surveyed on their thoughts about adding a school resource officer to the campuses.

About 17 percent of students responded to the survey. When asked how comfortable they would feel having a school resource officer at the middle and high school, 89 students, or almost 34 percent of respondents, said “very comfortable”; 58 students, or almost 22 percent, said “somewhat comfortable”; and 75 students, or 28 percent, said “neutral.” About 16 percent, or 44 students, said they would be “somewhat uncomfortable” or “uncomfortable” if a school resource officer were on site.

Students were not asked their race as part of the survey.

When students were asked how they think an officer on site would affect the safety and environment at their school, 112 students, or 42 percent, said it would have “some positive impact” and 32 students, or 12 percent, said it would have “no impact.”

Thirty-six percent of staff — 86 people — responded to a survey asking if they supported hiring a shared officer for the middle and high school. Sixty-five percent of the respondents said “yes,” 27 percent were “unsure” and 8 percent said “no.”

Of the 1,893 families surveyed, the district received 274 responses back, or 14 percent. Almost 80 percent of responding families said they were in support of adding a school resource officer to the middle and high school.

Johnson County Sheriff Brad Kunkel said the officer who will be selected as the district’s SRO will undergo “extensive training” ahead of next school year. The officer might even shadow an officer in another Eastern Iowa district for a few days, Kunkel said.

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“The keys to a successful SRO program are the right person and the right agreement, meaning that there are expectations of the SRO and boundaries for what they do,” Kunkel said. “I see them as a safety and law enforcement presence. What they’re not there to do is be a disciplinarian or administrative arm of the school.”

Kunkel said SROs can be an “advocate for kids” and visit classrooms to talk about public safety, especially online safety and cyberbullying.

What does the agreement say?

The nine-page 28E Agreement between the school district and Johnson County Sheriff’s Office specifies the duties and responsibilities of the school resource officer and the cost of the program.

The district would fund 60 percent of the SRO’s salary and related costs. The annual total salary and benefits cost for one deputy sheriff’s officer for the City of Tiffin is $146,000 for this fiscal year, Kunkel said.

The officer is to provide security during school hours and interact daily with students, parents, faculty and staff to develop positive relationships, according to the agreement. They will work in their uniform, carry a regulation sidearm and other approved and assigned equipment necessary to perform their job.

The SRO should be familiar with all law enforcement case information pertaining to schools, students and the neighborhood surrounding the campus and facilitate and assist with law enforcement investigations involving victims, witnesses and suspects associated with the schools.

SROs are “certified peace officers,” and will assist teachers with classroom presentations on relevant topics when requested, including peer pressure, bullying and harassment, “common teenage crimes,” drugs and alcohol and internet safety, according to the agreement. They will assist in coordinating security during district sporting events, activities, special events and other extracurricular events as requested by the district.

The SRO will not be available to conduct investigations extraneous to their assigned SRO responsibilities for the sake of convenience or expediency without prior approval from the SRO supervisor.

The SRO will become familiar with community agencies that aid youth and their families such as mental health clinics, drug treatment centers and protective shelters and make referrals to the agencies and notify school administration of any referrals.

ACLU of Iowa investigating impact of police in schools

The ACLU of Iowa last September launched a new initiative to examine the status and impact of school resource officers in Iowa schools. The investigation will conclude with a public report on its findings near the end of the school year.

The ACLU of Iowa is a nonprofit, nonpartisan organization that fights to advance civil liberties and uphold the Iowa and U.S. Constitution.

The investigation is being led by Iowa Legal Fellow Jacob Sarasin, an attorney from Cedar Rapids.

SROs are becoming more common in Iowa schools, including some elementary schools. SROs are police officers, usually armed, tasked with patrolling schools and interacting with students. The stated goal is often to keep students safe, but there is no conclusive evidence that police staffing in schools increases student safety or prevents mass shootings, according to the ACLU of Iowa.

Instead, research shows that police in schools actually create harm for many students, taking situations that could be dealt with less harshly and feeding students — especially students of color and students with disabilities — into the juvenile delinquency and adult criminal court systems, according to the ACLU of Iowa.

In 2022, the Cedar Rapids school board voted to remove officers from its middle schools. School board members said at the time that the same services provided by school resource officers could be provided to the middle schools “for free” by calling 911 or the police non-emergency number. School board members agreed having trained school therapists in schools instead of police is a better service to students.

The Cedar Rapids school district in 2021 audited its school resource officer program and began to make changes after many students asked for change. The district and the Cedar Rapids police set joint goals of reducing by 50 percent or more the number of student arrests and charges filed and of reducing the disproportionate arrests of Black students by 50 percent or more.

Five school resource officers remain in the Cedar Rapids district stationed at four of the district’s high schools and Polk Alternative school.

Other school districts in Eastern Iowa with a school resource officer are College Community, Linn-Mar and Marion Independent.

Comments: (319) 398-8411; grace.king@thegazette.com