ROCHESTER – New schools and increasing workloads are prompting Rochester Public Schools to consider adding more police, but some school board members are reluctant to sign off.
District officials want to add a sixth school resource officer (SRO) to help cover Rochester's three high schools, four middle schools, a special education building and an alternative learning center — even as Rochester reviews the role SROs play in student learning.
The new SRO contract would cost the district $30,000 through June, with some funding set aside to pay for an additional officer for at least one more year. The board is set to decide at its Jan. 17 meeting.
Adding another officer gives some school board members pause, however.
"Have we gotten to the point where all of the … things we've put in place are maxed out and the SRO is the thing that we need, or are there other things that we could be doing that don't require additional law enforcement presence in the school?" Board member Jessica Garcia said Tuesday during a public meeting.
Rochester, like other districts across Minnesota, has struggled in recent years over police in schools. Proponents say school resource officers help make schools safer while critics say a police presence escalates behavioral and racial issues in the classroom.
Rochester's board updated and approved the district's SRO contract in June, which fleshes out some boundaries between SROs and district officials when it comes to student discipline. The district has been studying SRO contact in schools as part of its ongoing strategic plan.
Though board members signed off on five officers last summer, district officials say the officer in charge of Century High School has been too busy to fulfill other obligations at nearby Kellogg and Dakota middle schools, including home visits for students in distress or taking students to emergency rooms if they require help.
