Trustees at the Toronto District School Board have voted to end the School Resource Officer program – a program that placed armed police officers in high schools.
The vote by the TDSB comes one week after a meeting to discuss a staff report, which followed a six-week period where students, staff and parents affected by the program were surveyed.
The report ultimately concluded that the SRO program should come to an end but noted that police and the school board should continue to work together to ensure safety in learning environments.
At the meeting, attendees, including TDSB trustees and members of the public, voted unanimously in favour of the staff report’s conclusion.
The SRO program had officers stationed at 45 TDSB high schools prior to suspension in August. It was implemented one year after 15-year-old Jordan Manners was fatally shot at C.W. Jefferys Collegiate Institute in 2007.
“We have to listen to the fact that in our 45 schools 15,000 students did a survey and over 2,000 students said that they felt intimidated, they felt watched, they felt targeted – that wasn’t the majority though,” TDSB chair Robin Pilkey said. “But, it is a significant number of students and I think it’s important when we’re listening to people that even if you’re not the majority we are still listening to you.”
An interim report on key findings related to the SRO program is expected to be completed by researchers at Ryerson University in January 2018.