VALLEY CITY, N.D. (AP) One of the few school resource officers in North Dakota says the role is as much about counseling and educating students as it is enforcing the law.
Cass County Deputy Chris Potter is in his first year as a school resource officer at Maple Valley School District. He says keeping students safe also means acting as a trusted adult and teaching them about issues such as drunken driving, domestic abuse and bullying.
About 19 North Dakota school districts have school resource officers. The program costs Maple Valley $50,000 a year.
Potter earlier this year testified in favor of a bill that would have allocated $1 million to put resource officers in up to 15 rural school districts. Legislators, however, killed the measure last week.