Prime Minister Edi Rama on the occasion of “Security Officers in Schools” project launch held a meeting at “Qemal Stafa” high school premises with teachers, parents and students of high schools in the capital:
Hello to everyone!
We are gathered here today to launch another programme related to school security and which is based on the cooperation between the Ministry of Education and Ministry of Interior in order to establish a new figure in the routine school life which is the security officer, man or woman, boys or girls who will first be settled in 15 high schools as the first part of programme implementation from March, functioning, interaction and of course to learn all necessary lessons in the context of this programme extent across all high school networks.
Why do we think the security officer figure is important to attach to schools at this phase?
We are aware that there is a gap between the teachers, parents, learners and the State Police to all those either trivial or serious concerning cases that are displayed in school life.
It is naturally sensible that if teachers or the school directorate or the administration encompasses certain hardships related to the violence phenomenon, to selling of consuming narcotic substances, to a lack of discipline in general – is impossible such worries are addressed by directly involving the State Police.
In this regard, security officer figure will be established who is not a police officer, does not come to the school community to exercise controls, who is not in charge to undertake measures, but who is attached to the school teaching body and to the parents body as a caretaker figure to maintain co-existence outside classrooms and in the school yard, as well as in the relationships between the classroom, the yard and the external part of school. It implies that he or she is a direct communication bridge, be it between students, teachers with each other or between teachers, students and parents. Simultaneously it is a direct communication bridge with the Police to all cases when the Police inclusion is needed to one reason or another.
This experience is not genuinely Albanian and it is not an experiment we have come up with. It is a widely known experience in other countries, very successful, very welcomed by teachers and very welcomed by parents and students.
It is an experience that has significantly increased safety in schools, has significantly increased communication and interaction to address precisely these concerning issues as above mentioned. To establish a clear indicatory database related to worries and to treat them in real time with direct real-to-life individuals.
The way how the programme is organised will lead us to having one, two or three security officers according to the schools’ volume, who will accompany the entire process of co-existence in schools from the beginning to the end of the school day and it will guarantee that both the Ministry of Education and the Ministry of Interior will have much information in relation to external threats to school, to harassments, to the possibility of offering and selling narcotic substances and to all indecent displays within the school premises, in the teaching process, to which teachers might have an immediate need to have somebody on the side concerning the address of a threatening behaviour to the class or either to the teachers themselves.
These phenomenon are not Albanian but are instead encountered in all schools in the world and establishing such figures, I am convinced it will be an added value to the process.
Security officers will all be educated people to have undergone the Security Academy, trained people especially to this task which, as underlined by the deputy minister of Interior is not a police work but it is a task related to intercommunity cooperation and they will be friends of students, friends of teachers, parents’ friends. Hence, they will compensate in a way the gap that teachers cannot fill, that parents cannot fill, that students themselves cannot fill which is that in-the-middle acting area of all others. We are trustful that even here in our educational system we will have outcomes others have had out of this experience.
We utterly believe that information gathering ability will increase significantly, by the school administration, students and parents as well as the opportunity between students to prevent or solve different kinds of conflicts thanks to this mediator figure to be added to the school community.
The Security Academy director is attending as well, a long career police officer, an honourable professor I would refer the word to in order to make any additions to what we hitherto said and to underline exactly that the security officer is a figure that stands between the Ministry of Education responsibility and the Ministry of Interior; Ministry of Education responsibility to create the best conditions to the entire teaching and post-teaching process in the school and the Ministry of Interior responsibility to guarantee that safety is an indisputable component of this process.
-Hello! I am a teacher of informatics. “Safer schools. Security officers in schools” project is a much expected initiative from all. There is no parent who would not wish his child is in an unsafe school. Security officers in schools will convey certain values, integrity, discretion and professionalism. Non-negotiable values, while my question is how professionalism as a value will be felt? Will it be pedagogic, physical, psychosocial professionalism, thus how much worth will it have? And the second question, “considering security officers as a friend, as a collaborator he will be able to recognise the history and background of the student, the booklet says, which I agree with. How will it be accomplished? What components will this aspect consist of?
Prime Minister Edi Rama: Thank you to your attentive read of the booklet. It is certainly a process. First, it should guarantee if this individuals’ selection is appropriate, who will preferably derive from the Security Academy but the process is not terminated to others who could be persons graduated for psychology, who have studied pedagogy or social work, but to all these cases undergoing special training at the Security Academy is a precondition. It is not about a mere pedagogic figure which has the exact capacity and background and the proper training to built all this database in close cooperation with teachers, the school director and parents.
It a step-by-step established data base not all immediately. It is a data base related to everyday school life. The school has different student categories; excellent students, ordinary students, disruptive students and thus a specific professional work undertaken by this security officers network will enable the teachers, parents and students’ community to have a clear reading of all risk potentials that might exhibit in the shape of, let’s say benign shapes in the classroom, and in a malign form in the relation of students to the outside environment. We have researched several experiences, similar and different, but something is certain that all experiences despite how different they might be have caused a significant increase of safety in schools. They have brought around a very significant boost of the school and parents monitoring capacity on students, a capacity improbable to provide merely by the school administration or teachers as besides teachers are the pillars of the entire educational process and not teaching only, it is impossible due to their work to specifically attend to this aspect. It is impossible to them to monitor interactions. There are thousands of interactions that occur during a school day, there are interactions among students and the outside environment which as you know better than me, is exhibited with its own threats. Such a figure’s presence will guarantee these interactions monitoring, which later guarantees certain activity areas’ focus of all people constituting the school community, will guarantee priority pursue of elements in need of assistance and care, in need of a dedicated work and in this regard real time parent-contacting is guaranteed.
On the other hand, the process as a whole guarantees a strong tie between the school in this respect, educational directorates and the State Police when it is about problems that need to be addressed by the State Police directly. We have encountered different threat or risk displays, just as we have seen throughout our governing period, how much interest there is on the parents behalf as well as on the teachers towards a discipline increase not in a formal sense but in the monitoring capacity sense and everyone redirect this term at the government and by all means! We have thought as proper, in order to achieve it, the integration of the security officer figure in such direction which as stated by the deputy minister they will be endorsed of a dotted programme of their interactions with the academic body, the parents, the principle, as well as be inside their network which is led and monitored by the highest structures, be it the Ministry of Interior of the Ministry of Education.
-Hello! I am a representative of the Security Academy which probably unlike other participants I have much more knowledge on real cases related to problematic children at school. I thank the initiators of such a novelty but as it happens to any initiative it will have its first complaints and nonetheless I can say that it is even delayed, it should have been carried out earlier. My request is that since the State Police gives priority to prevention, this initiative should also include elementary schools. It should be comprehensive as children face different problems such as the most elementary one, bullying.
Prime Minister Edi Rama: I mentioned it earlier but probably without highlighting properly that the programme is created to cover all the schooling system. However, what we always do and what I believe is most common sense to undertake a piloted first phase, to test all the drafts, the plans concretely in the field, as there is a plethora you cannot foresee and cannot detail-plan in reality. Hence first phase will be a pilot phase where we have a reality check of what to bear in mind during the further extent of this network to all schools. It is obvious that elementary schools will ultimately be included, but the initial idea is to be implemented in high schools, with the communities having the largest students’ volume due to territory consideration in the first analysis. So, potential threats in different territories are surveyed.
It certainly is delayed, many things were and are delayed, so I was born in due time, the issue is that time defines the multitude of things that happen. What it is important is to perform things and also to do them better as we do not want to hurry by undertaking things we cannot finish. Although as long as it belongs to us at least this could not be performed earlier. Let me remind you of something. You perhaps know it, others do not or either have no reason of knowing it. The State Police was bases on statistics four years ago, the oldest age-based police force and the most illiterate police in the region, not to mention Europe. When I say uneducated, we refer to the number with a university education, or high school education or even old system elementary education and some without any education at all. The most illiterate!
Security Academy was closed, non-existent. There were some classes undertaken just for the sake of it but we reopened the Academy to start a regenerating process based on the necessity to decrease age and increase education. We are still far from where we should to have necessary standards either on the education viewpoint or age point of view but this demands a time span as a certain number of students is required every academic year and so on.
This initiative based on the Security Academy, based on those who graduate from the Academy as well as on trainings at the Academy, psychologist and social workers, and it could not be done earlier objectively, and still it will take more than a year to extend to all schools.
Our aim is to expand the programme in all the country’s schools within three years and have the maximum impact as the opportunity this programme offers is extraordinary. There should absolutely be a qualitative guaranteed selection, there should certainly be guaranteed professionalism and we must ensure that this will take place in all schools. If we present it in figures, and calculate how many schools there are, how many security officers will be needed and what are the possibilities now to take external individuals who meet the criteria. It is too hard. So we will learn from the first experience, however, I am hopeful that the piloted schools will result in important changes, psychologically, at community-level and a highly positive impact to all, the teachers, students and parents, within three months.
Whether there is anyone considering the programme worrisome or a problem or even a danger, it would be good to take the floor so we could listen to.
-Hello! I am “Andon Zako Cajupi” school president. I find the project and excellent idea. I am not aware if my school is part of the plan since we also encounter the problem of afternoon schooling due to reconstruction.
Prime Minister Edi Rama: Yes, it is included in the project.
-Hello! I am a student at “Eqerem Cabej” school. The idea sounds very good indeed as it will provide safety to all schools and I think that it is even better than previous years.
-Hello! The project is a great idea that we as students do not have to say “police is here” and it triggers an alarm but have a closer approach between parents, students and government structures.
-Hello! I am a teacher of “Abdulla Keta” school. Personally, I think that it is fairer schools integrate a psychologist rather than a security officer. The more psychologists present at all times the healthier it would be. It would not then be necessary to have a security officer.
Prime Minister Edi Rama: You are right but they do not exclude each other. Hence security officers, as stated earlier, as well as those who have graduated psychology are potential selectees. Meanwhile those under training and who will be trained for this job will receive something related to the psychologist practice but, however, they do not substitute each other or rule each other out, in all cases. If you carefully read the simple description on the booklet it is different from the psychologist work considered entirely on its own, although psychologists’ services should necessarily be empowered. It is present but it should absolutely be amplified. Thus they are complementary not exclusive. The psychologist certainly has a particular role in the practice with students but cannot cover monitoring risks and prevention or treating external threats. It is impossible. Just like he cannot participate and intervene on problematic interactions between the students or students and teachers and so on. Hence, both are complementary.
