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What risks
and opportunities do students encounter between home
and school?
Providing students with a safe route to school can reduce
their fears considerably, and have a tremendous impact
on school attendance, performance and overall safety.
Depending on staffing priorities, police officers may
be able to focus on these routes during specified times.
Not only does this improve route safety, but also provides
an opportunity for officers to establish positive relationships
with children under nontraumatic circumstances, laying
the groundwork for community policing programs. Emergency
call buttons or standard pay phones should be accessible,
at a height suitable for children or wheelchair users
along the way.
Organizing a neighborhood cleanup can reduce
physical risk and build a support network at the same time.
Graffiti can be painted over, and offensive advertising
can be discouraged to organize social and political pressure.
Neighbors along the route to school, equipped with cell
phones or radios, can be recruited to serve as crossing
guards or monitors. Drawing friendly neighbors onto the
sidewalks makes the environment considerably safer-offenders
prefer to approach their victims away from potential witnesses
and allies.
Businesses and residents can work with the
police and in establishing safe havens along the route,
into which children can retreat, if they feel threatened,
and where help he is a readily available. Programs such
as Block Home, Block Watch, and Neighborhood Watch fill
this role. Police background checks should be integrated
into the program to build confidence and screen out unsafe
participants. Businesses can also serve as sites for community
service projects or field trips, internships, or after-school
jobs.
Walking school buses can be organized, in which children
and adults coordinate traveling in groups to and from school,
providing security through numbers. Neighbors who step
forward in the name of school safety also may be willing
to participate in other activities to support the school,
such as voting for bond measures, attending school performances
and athletic events, or volunteering their time as classroom
aides or guest speakers.
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