Chief Di Filippo will be making a presentation to the Edgewater Park Board of Education and Ridgway, Magowan, and Jacques Parents, concerning School Safety at the next Board of Education Meeting on March 27, 2018 starting at 6:30 pm.
As we all, unfortunately, know, the incidents of School Violence have increased throughout our Country. The perpetrators of these incidents vary in age and reason, but the one thing we realize from these incidents is that we must make sure that our School Staff and Students are prepared in the unlikely event of School Violence at one of our locations.
Our School Staff, School Safety Committee, and I have worked diligently to be one of the first Middle Schools in the State of NJ to even have a Safety Policy for students as a direct result of the lessons learned from Columbine on April 20, 1999. Our First implementation of a School Safety Program occurred in September of 2000. Over the years to follow, our program has consistently changed and improved, given lessons learned from our own issues as well as those learned from incidents occurring throughout our Country. Florida, Sandy Hook, Columbine, etc. were all horrible tragedies, but we must make sure we learn from them and try to improve our own Policies and Procedures to do our best to prevent incidents of violence in our schools.
Recently, the school has made outstanding infrastructure changes to improve on security. We have done well in our efforts and our Staff and Students are very well trained. However, we continue to strive for improvement. Based on this, we are introducing a new, updated, module to our present security policy. Teachers and Staff will be attending Classes and "hands on" practical sessions over the next several weeks to implement this new policy into our present security policy. Once teachers are instructed on this policy, Students will be trained as well.
On Tuesday, March 27, 2018, starting at 6:30 pm, I'm inviting parents of our Schools (Ridgway, Magowan, and Jacques) to attend the Board of Education Meeting at Ridgway School. At that meeting I will be making a School Safety Presentation and will also be taking questions from parents about school safety issues. We want our parents to be aware of the steps we are taking to improve and maintain school security and to also get our parents to stress the importance of school safety and following school procedures in the event of a violent incident at the school to their children!
Thank you all and hope to see you there!
-Chief Gene J. Di Filippo