THE NEW school year brought new things. While many students received new out ts, school sup- plies, and were enrolled in new classes; the school also added a new police of cer. Last year, there were only two. Now, Grang- er has added just one new mem- ber to their team.

Of cer Parks has been work- ing at Granger High School since the new school year started. He and his fellow coworkers have been noticed around campus dur- ing lunches and at school events.

“There appears to be a lot more cops actually on campus. Last year, it didn’t seem like there were so many. Now, it’s like ev- erywhere I look, there’s usually at least two in the area,” Milagros Cuevas (10) said.

Others haven’t really noticed

that there are more of cers on campus. It could be because they just don’t notice or the of cers had not been in that speci c area. “I didn’t notice any more of cers than the ones that were here last year,” Kat Henry (10) said.

Attentive students have been wondering why there are more of cers than the previous year. Some have thought that a certain incident lead to it and others just thought that there was too much violence last year.

“Students attending here need to have a great place to further their education while having a sense of safety,” Mr. Beck said.

The of cers feel the same way. “My main priority is having a safe school. If we don’t have a safe school, then I’m not doing my job right,” Of cer Johnson said.

Also, learning to work around

police of cers can be bene cial for the future. Social media has tilted toward a speci c image of of cers, so interacting with them informally can help create a better sense of what connects citizens and students to police of cers.

“Having the cops here helps students work with them. It’s 95% about having cops here to building trust, so part of the rea- son for having them here helps structure the environment,” Of – cer Johnson said.

In addition, of cers help the environment in various ways. “By just having the cops on cam- pus, it can make students not do certain things,” Mr. Beck said.

Some Lancers agree with Mr. Beck. “Since Granger is a big school and different types of stu- dents go here, having cops visible can decrease the amount of bad

decisions. For example, someone could have an intention of doing something bad, but if they see the cops, then they’ll most likely not do it,” Henry said.

That said, social media has im- pacted how others may think of authority gures.

“Tons of people already think of cops a certain way. We’re not all the same. Get to know me— me as an individual. All of the of- cers aren’t all the same. Just get to know us before judging us,” Of cer Parks said.

Since police of cers help maintain order at Granger, they’ll stay for the entire school year.

“As far as we were informed, we’ll keep the same amount of cops here until at least the end of the school year. We don’t know if there will be more next year,” Of- cer Johnson said.