The pair provide approximately 18 hours of coverage a week to the high school -- and by extension to the community itself
WESTHAMPTON -- School resource officers Scott Gove and Matt Malo strive to bring a sense of safety and community to the halls of Hampshire Regional High School.
The pair, who provide approximately 18 hours of coverage a week to the high school -- and by extension to the community at large -- seem to be ideally suited for the job.
Gove is a full-time police officer in Southampton, which accounts for about 50 percent of the high school's 730-plus students. For the past 14 years he's also served as a teacher in the DARE program at Norris School in that town.
"I am friendly with all of the Southampton kids coming up here," said Gove, who frequently works morning hours at the high school and the 4 p.m. to midnight shift in Southampton.
Malo, who grew up in Southampton, graduated from Hampshire Regional High School in 1992 and is a part-time officer with the Westhampton Police Department.
"I jumped at the chance," Malo said of the resource officer position. "It's pretty cool to walk the halls again."
Next year, Malo said, his daughter will start attending classes there as a middle-schooler.
Malo also has a full-time job as a sergeant with the University of Massachusetts Police Department, where he has been working for 19 years.
The school serves students in grades seven to 12 from the towns of Westhampton, Southampton, Williamsburg, Goshen, Worthington and Chesterfield.
Westhampton Police Chief David White said the school resource officer program here is somewhat unusual for a regional school, particularly one that is based in a town as small as Westhampton, which has a part-time police department.
Police coverage here, as is with many small towns in Western Massachusetts, is augmented by state police. White said one of his goals in working with the school district to launch the program about three years ago was to enhance daytime coverage for the town.
"It gives the town of Westhampton the ability to have an officer in town during the day when normally it would be covered by state police," White said.
The resource officer program is funded by both the town and the school district, he said.
Gove and Malo said they believe they bring some peace of mind to those who work and study at the school.
"The staff and students are relaxed when they see us, it's reassuring to them," Gove said.
The officers carry their service firearms in the school but wear a "soft" uniform that includes khakis and golf shirts.
The police chief stressed the two officers' presence at the high school is more about building relationships with students than law enforcement.
"It's about having an officer making contact with these young people early on so we can identify those that need to get additional resources early on," said White.
If warranted, the officers can reach out to parents to try to prevent potential issues from blossoming into bigger problems, he said.
Kristen Smidy, principal of Hampshire Regional High School, said Gove and Malo's presence has made a difference in the school. "I think people see them as familiar faces and people that they can go to for support," she said.
Sarah Pietrzak, one of the school's guidance counselors, said she appreciates the community dimension Gove and Malo bring to the school.
"It's amazing," she said. "It's a huge bridge for the community and the school to keep us together."
Sarah Jablonski, administrative assistant to the guidance office and adviser to the school's Students Against Destructive Decisions group, agreed. "I really appreciate having them here," she said.
The officers have the ability to vary their hours depending on need, Smidy said.
At the start of the school year, for example, Gove and Malo came in for the start of the school day so they could greet arriving students and parents and help them get a sense of how the traffic should flow for pick-ups and drop-offs.
Malo and Gove also work with state police and other regional law enforcement personnel to conduct lockdown drills and training needed to prepare for potential emergencies, including mass casualty events, that could occur at the school.
Last spring, they worked with representatives from 11 agencies, student and parent volunteers, and bus drivers to conduct a drill on the process of safely transporting students away from the school to a secure location, in this instance Norris School in Southampton, where they can be reunited with their caregivers.
The exercise, known as a reunification drill, started with the participating students in lockdown mode within various classrooms at the school. That includes locking the doors, dimming the lights and lowering shades and remaining quiet.
Participating law-enforcement agencies, including police from Northampton, Southampton and Easthampton, then methodically cleared the building as they would in an actual emergency and initiated the process to get students safely off-campus.
Both officers said it was a valuable learning experience. "We found a lot of things that we did right and a lot of things that we did wrong, but it was a step in the right direction," Gove said,
This past summer, the two officers reviewed the process and their findings at a seminar attended by approximately 50 area law enforcement and school administrative personnel.
The officers also spearheaded an effort to obtain what are known as "Go Buckets" for all the schools within the district towns. Go Buckets contain emergency supplies, including food and water, first aid kits, toilet paper and other sanitary supplies, and other items that could be used by students and staff during a lockdown.
Community contributors to the effort included the Home Depot in Westfield, which provided 150 buckets and lids, and various contributions from the Southampton Lions Club, Costco in West Springfield, Tighe & Bond in Westfield and Fleury Lumber in Easthampton.
White said he was thankful for the help from the community in assembling the Go Buckets. He said putting them together, much like the drills, was a sobering reminder that schools nowadays need to be prepared for the worst.
White said he hopes to find or develop funding sources over the next few years that would allow enough additional part-time officers to be hired to essentially bring full-time coverage to the school.
"If we were able to get more officers that would be wonderful," Smidy said.