Police will have a presence in some public schools in the new academic year to help stem the level of violence that plagued the system last year, Minister of Education Alfred Sears has confirmed.
Thousands of students were due to head back to school today.
Minister Sears told The Bahama Journal that the Ministry of Social Services and Community Development and the Royal Bahamas Police Force will pool their resources with the Ministry of Education.
“We have put tremendous emphasis on a programme called ‘Safe Schools’,” Minister Sears said. “[This programme] is an initiative within the Ministry of Education providing incentives to administrators and the schools to really develop this sense of stewardship. We are open to additional suggestions.”
Minister Smith sees the move as a proactive one.
He said that his ministry has already started to build facilities at various campuses to accommodate this new initiative.
“Technical teams from the Ministry of Education have been meeting with police representatives to craft a collaboration that will be consistent with the nature of the school and the pursuit of educational objectives,” Minister Sears said.
He noted that Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of National Security Cynthia Pratt pointed to this when she contributed to debate on the 2005/2006 budget in the House of Assembly.
The initiative is considered another aspect of the Urban Renewal project.
Earlier this year, Prime Minister Perry Christie asked Police Commissioner Paul Farquharson to look at integrating the police into the school system in an effort to cut down on the level of violence in public schools.
That recommendation was made after the stabbing death of 15-year-old Orlander Williamson, a student of the C. V. Bethel Senior High School, who was allegedly stabbed to death by another student.
While stressing that the government is careful not to interfere with the work of the police, the prime minister said he would like to see the community policing initiative go further with police officers becoming involved in the operations at local schools.
Many parents say that they would embrace the presence of the Royal Bahamas Police Force in public schools. But there are some who question how effective such an initiative would be given that police officials have for some time now been pointing out their limited resources.
Minister of National Security Cynthia Pratt has on more than one occasion made this point, noting that there are just over 2,200 police officers for a population of 300,000.
By: Stephen Gay, The Bahama Journal
