The Rockwood School District’s latest layer of protection is in place.
The district’s four new school safety officers began working July 1.
The safety officers’ main assignment is patrolling elementary schools and early childhood centers in Rockwood’s four quadrants of Eureka, Lafayette in the Wildwood area, Marquette in the Chesterfield and Ballwin areas, and Rockwood Summit in the Fenton area.
Each officer is assigned a quadrant to patrol, and the officers change quadrants each quarter throughout the school year, Rockwood safety supervisor Tyrone Dennis said.
The new safety officers are Joseph Early, Zeus Hernandez, Mark Tinkham and David Weiss. They each are paid $28.13 an hour and work from 8 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. every school day, according to district officials.
Early, 55, of west St. Louis County was a St. Louis County Police officer from 1998 to 2023.
Hernandez, 37, of St. Louis was a police officer with the Des Peres and Chesterfield police departments from 2007 to 2022.
Tinkham, 54, of St. Louis retired from the Eureka Police Department after serving as an officer there from 1997 to 2023.
Weiss, 64, of St. Louis is a retired Chesterfield Police officer. He was an officer from 1979 to 2023.
“With the four safety officers, we have more than 116 years of law enforcement experience combined,” Dennis said. “Their presence in our elementary schools is a breath of fresh air. I work with a great group of officers. They make my job easy.”
Mary LaPak, the district’s chief communications officer, said Rockwood’s greatest security need was at the early childhood centers and elementary schools because school resource officers (SROs) are assigned to middle schools and high schools.
She said Rockwood has 13 SROs, who are employed through the various law enforcement agencies throughout the district. The district and each agency share the cost of each SRO’s salary.
LaPak said an advantage of Rockwood hiring its own safety officers is their ability to provide security for every building in the district, instead of being limited to being assigned to schools inside a law enforcement agency’s jurisdiction.
“If needed, (the safety officers) can be dispatched to a middle school or high school, of course,” she said. “That is the beauty of having our own officers as employees. We can have them respond to any school in the district, and we don’t have to worry about which jurisdiction they are in.”
Safety officer’s day
Early started Sept. 6 by greeting students at Blevins Elementary School, 25 E. North St., in Eureka. He exchanged high fives, fist bumps or waves with students as they entered the school.
“We preach safety for our schools, and what better way to be safe than having our own school officers?” Blevins Principal Hector Ramirez said. “I’m confident that they’re going to keep us safe and that our community feels safe with all of them being around.”
Early then made his way to the Eureka Early Childhood Center, 442 W. Fourth St., to check in on the preschool in what was Eureka Elementary School.
After that, he went to Geggie Elementary School, 430 Bald Hill Road, and then to Eureka Elementary School, 5350 Rockwood Arbor Drive.
Every safety officer is assigned a district-owned SUV with Rockwood markings, and they carry a firearm and non-lethal weapons. Early’s SUV had that new-car smell, and the radio softly played classic rock as he made his way from school to school.
Early said he changes the order he visits each school daily to make sure no one can figure out a pattern of where and when he will be in the quadrant that he is patrolling.
“Tomorrow, my schedule is going to be completely different,” he said. “I like to be outside for a period of time, to check the perimeters of the schools. Then, when we get into the schools, I always look for the principals and the staff. We talk to them to make sure all is well.
“We do interact with students, but we don’t want to interfere with their day-to-day activities. We want to keep them focused.”
In the early afternoon, Early returned to Blevins to check on students having lunch.
When he entered the school, Early signed in at the front office and said hello to the school’s secretary, Angela Ewers. He scanned the hallways and then checked each exterior door to ensure they were closed and locked properly. Simultaneously, Early greeted teachers and students as they passed him in the halls.
In the cafeteria, he stopped to have conversations with students having lunch. Children eagerly asked Early important questions such as if he loves turtles or if he’s gone hunting recently. (His answers: “Yes, of course I love turtles,” and “No, I haven’t hunted in a long time.”)
Students raised their hands, and if Early was nearby, he helped them open a package of sliced apples or stick a straw in a juice box.
“It’s good because we’re not only providing security measures for the schools in the district, but we’re also having community relations,” Early said. “We’re already forming that relationship, that bond with law enforcement, and then when (students) get to the middle schools and the high schools, which actually have SROs, they’re already familiar with the whole thing and comfortable with it.
“By interacting with them, they can realize that there’s nothing scary about the police. We’re here to help them, help the community and to protect everybody.”
Next on Early’s afternoon itinerary was Eureka Elementary. He stayed in his SUV for a few minutes to scan the parking lot and perimeter before making his way inside.
After signing in, Early began checking the halls once more. A class just finished checking out books at the library, and Early took a few minutes to greet students in the hallway. Students showed Early what books they checked out.
Early then made his way to the cafeteria, where kindergarten students were having lunch, before leaving and heading to Geggie Elementary.
Once Early signed in at Geggie, he noticed that the school had some new faces. Parents were invited that day to eat lunch with their children. He greeted them on his way to the cafeteria, where older elementary school students were finishing lunch.
Because of the noise and additional adults in the cafeteria, Early remained in the background, constantly scanning the room.
Even with streams of students passing Early on their way to class, the library or front office, he didn’t seem worried about the chaos. He spoke to assistant principal Timothy Rebholz before wrapping up his time at the school.
After leaving the school, he hopped in his SUV to eat his own lunch, packed in a small red Playmate cooler. He said he doesn’t usually stop long to eat lunch – taking a few minutes here and there to eat a snack – before heading to the next school.
Early said his assignment is to provide a safe learning environment for children. The children’s assignment, he said, is to focus on learning.
During the Sept. 7 Board of Education meeting, David Cobb, assistant superintendent of supervision of schools, said safety protocols must evolve just as other areas of the district evolve.
“Adding safety is an ongoing thing, just like we do with curriculum or any other thing that’s extremely important,” Cobb said. “Safety should be at the forefront of all of our agendas so we can constantly stay up to date.”
Rockwood adds safety measures
The addition of four security officers is not the only step the Rockwood School District has taken recently to create safer school environments.
Safety supervisor Tyrone Dennis discussed various measures at the Sept. 7 Board of Education meeting.
He highlighted a pilot emergency response system at four schools, and the addition of signs and new security cameras in the district’s buildings.
Dennis said the district is using the Raptor Safety System this school year at two Eureka schools – Eureka Elementary and Eureka High School – and two schools in Ballwin – Westridge Elementary and Selvidge Middle.
“Any time we get any new equipment, we try to start slowly to work out any kinks or anything that doesn’t work properly,” he said. “The system allows our staff to alert us through their phones. They have different mechanisms on their phone that basically alert the entire building in the case of an intruder.”
Dennis said the principals at the four schools will provide feedback on how Raptor works and if it would be a viable emergency alert system for the rest of the district.
Colorful and large signs have been added to the inside and outside of buildings, which helps those not familiar with the schools to get around, Dennis said. Each sign sticks out roughly a foot from the wall so law enforcement officers can identify a room from the end of the hall.
“The numbering of the doors is new across the district this year,” Dennis said. “This helps with giving your location.”
The same signs mark the windows outside the building so that law enforcement officers can identify rooms and locations before entering, safety officer Joseph Early said.
“Most officers have no idea what the inside of the school looks like,” said Early. “They know where a school is, but they’ve never seen the inside of it. (During an emergency) they’re going to come in and immediately start looking for colors, then pinpoint the correct numbers of the classroom.”
Rockwood also has 320 new security cameras installed in 21 schools before this school year began. Schools receiving the new cameras include Eureka Early Childhood, Geggie Elementary, Pond Elementary and LaSalle Springs Middle School, the district reported.
Deborah Ketring, Rockwood’s chief information officer, said the new cameras replaced outdated equipment that provided low-resolution images.
“We just felt it was time to update the cameras because some of them are more than 10 years old,” she said.
The Board of Education voted 6-0 on March 16 to buy the cameras for $57,744.10.
Dennis said visitors are still adjusting to the visitor management system that was installed in buildings for the 2022-2023 school year. The system is called SchoolPass, and those coming to schools may download a QR code to streamline the check-in process.
Dennis said the sign-in process allows school employees to monitor who comes in and out of buildings. If visitors do not have a SchoolPass QR code, they will need to bring a photo ID to enter the school. All visitors, as well as teachers, administrators and other employees, scan their code at the front office.
“We had a walkthrough (on Sept. 6) at one of the schools, and I was impressed to see all of the safety measures before we even made it to the principal’s office,” Dennis said. “A lot of people take it for granted because they don’t know exactly what it is or why it’s there. We like to keep it kind of discreet for the students, but safety is taken seriously in the district. It’s our top priority and my everyday job.”
