RBR welcomes first school resource officer

Officer Peter Gibson, RBR's first SRO (school resource officer), gets acquainted with three students at RBR during lunch. Pictured with Gibson (l-r) are Monica Tauro and Julianne Malley of Union Beach and Ashley Mullins of Little Silver.

LITTLE SILVER - Police Officer Peter Gibson has a new beat. The Little Silver police officer is the first school resource officer (SRO) at his alma mater, Red Bank Regional High School (RBR).

"I am very interested in getting to know all the kids and want them to know that we have established a safe and confidential environment where they can come to me at all times with any concerns," he said.

Gibson, a Shrewsbury resident, is already a friendly face to many RBR students as he begins his second year as a volunteer football coach at the high school.

"I run into the kids all around the area, and they always greet me and introduce me to their friends. So the 60 kids I know have grown to 120 and more," he said.

In addition to coaching, last spring Gibson organized a very successful week of activities, titled Project Prom, at RBR in collaboration with the school, the borough police department and the emergency responders of the other RBR sending school towns.

Project Prom was designed to discourage student drinking and driving during prom season. Statistics bear out that the last two weekends in May to the first three weekends in June (prom season) prove to be the deadliest on the nation's roads for teenagers.

Locating officers at schools is a growing trend across the country as well as in New Jersey. The organization that trained Gibson as an SRO, The National Association of School Resource Officers (NASRO), has trained more than 10,000 officers throughout the world.

Little Silver Police Chief Shannon Giblin believed placing an officer in the school was so important that he made it one of his department's top initiatives last year. Following a series of discussions with RBR Superintendent of Schools Dr. Edward Westervelt, who concurred, the town and the school board collaborated to fund the position for the 2007-2008 school year.

"The fact of the matter is that, with 1,200 students and 200 staff, RBR is the biggest business in Little Silver, and it just makes sense to have an officer here all the time," Westervelt said. "It is very important for parents to realize, with everything that goes on today in high schools, that we are doing everything to keep their students safe."

Westervelt also credits the Little Silver mayor and Borough Council for having the foresight to see the value of establishing the position in the regional high school.

"We want to establish relationships with kids through our on-site police officer who, as a mentor and role model to the students, opens lines of communication with the students," he said.

He added that the SRO would be responsible for fostering two-way communication with the students' home communities.

"We have always had good communications with the RBR sending school towns, but this makes a good communication policy even better," Giblin said.

Gibson will begin each day with a short meeting with Principal Jim Stefankiewicz to touch base on the school's events and what might be pertinent to security. Additionally, he will operate as a resource for other school programs and functions such as RBR's school-based youth services program, The Source, as well as the Guidance Department and the student assistant counselor.

Other programs Gibson is interested in creating include an extracurricular club for students who are contemplating a career in law enforcement.

For now, Gibson's first priority will be to get to know the students at RBR. He will be a continual presence at their lunch periods, sitting down and talking to the students in a relaxed atmosphere. The school provides him with an office, Room 303, where students as well as staff can talk to him in confidence.

"I have an open-door policy and invite everyone to come in and talk," he said.