ELIZABETHTOWN — During the week of July 18-22, the Bladen County Sheriff’s Office conducted School Resource Officer training for 10 Bladen County deputies who will receive their certification as a SRO from the North Carolina Department of Justice, Sheriff’s Training and Standards Division.

The training was conducted by Deputy Matt Long, who is the sergeant over the SRO squad. He is a certified instructor who has completed the SRO train-the-trainer instruction, as delivered by the North Carolina Justice Academy. The basic SRO course is a mandatory 40-hour course authored by the NCJA.

School Resource Officers serve as comprehensive resources in the schools to which they are assigned. North Carolina Sheriffs and Criminal Justice Training and Standards, define SRO as, any law enforcement officer assigned to one or more public schools within a local school administrative unit, as defined in G.S. 115C-5(6), who works in a school at least 20 hours per week for more than 12 weeks per calendar year to assist with all of the following:

* School safety;

* School security;

* Emergency preparedness;

* Emergency response; and

* Any additional responsibilities related to school safety or security assigned by the officer’s employer while the officer is acting as a SRO.

“We are very pleased to have ten additional deputies to complete the SRO training, which brings us to a total of 17 deputies who have completed the training,” said Sheriff Jim McVicker. “My goal is to get as many deputies trained and certified as SRO’s as I can, to assist with keeping our children and schools safe.

“We are forever grateful to the county commissioners for the recent approval of six additional SRO positions in our schools,” McVicker added. “With the six additional positions, we will eventually be able to assign a certified SRO to every school in Bladen County. As always, we appreciate everyone’s support in keeping our children and schools safe.”