Worcester County Sheriff's Office at a School

SNOW HILL, Md. - Worcester County Public Schools have issued what it calls a "final statement" on school safety, as the district says it will no longer participate in a public back-and-forth with the Worcester County Sheriff's Office and the Worcester County State's Attorney.

The full statement is published at the bottom of this article. The statement read in part "Worcester County Public Schools (WCPS), the Board of Education and school system staff will no longer be engaging in public statement trading with law enforcement officials. We believe it is counterproductive, and our focus must remain on keeping our schools the safe and welcoming learning environments that our students and staff deserve."

Worcester County Public Schools released the statement just a day after Sheriff Matt Crisafulli and State's Attorney Kris Heiser released a video, expressing continued frustration with the School District regarding school safety.

Crisafulli said the District recently held a public safety meeting, inviting him, but not inviting State's Attorney Heiser.

In the video, Crisafulli says in part "School leadership needs to determine what type of school environments they want to foster. Those where principals are free to hide and minimize crime and excuse misconduct, or those where principals are told to cooperate and communicate with our SRDs and establish law and order."

A full link to the video can be found by clicking here.

WBOC has covered this issue extensively. In early March, principals came to the defense of the district saying it is doing enough to keep schools safe. While in late February, Crisafulli and Heiser blamed school leadership for a dramatic rise in crime.

Below is the full "final statement" released by Worcester County Public Schools on Friday.

In light of law enforcement’s video presentation last night, the Worcester County Board of Education is issuing the following final public statement on this matter.
 
As stewards of the safety, well-being, and education of the thousands of students in Worcester County Public Schools (WCPS), the Board of Education and school system staff will no longer be engaging in public statement trading with law enforcement officials. We believe it is counterproductive, and our focus must remain on keeping our schools the safe and welcoming learning environments that our students and staff deserve.
 
Our school and Central Office leaders will continue to work collaboratively with our School Deputies to ensure the safety of our students and staff in alignment with our Memorandum of Understanding (MOU). We fully expect law enforcement to do the same, and our invitation remains open for the Sheriff’s Office to meet with school system leadership.
 
We also want to reiterate to our school system community what we have shared before: our school system has a robust team approach to safety and discipline, which includes a retired school deputy as well as our Chief Safety and Academic Officer.
 
WCPS also has consistent communication standards regarding school safety incidents. To be clear with our families, these standards include the following:
  • Should your child be directly involved or impacted by an incident, you will receive a direct notification from school administration.  
  • If an incident has a wider impact, but has been resolved, class or schoolwide notifications will be sent that evening.
  • Should a school’s safety status change (i.e. iloveuguys Standard Response Protocol), schools will communicate the change as quickly as circumstances allow and will follow-up once the school’s status has returned to normal operations.
Lastly, we thank our entire school system community for their continued patience and understanding. We encourage our families to continue to have conversations with their children as well as with our schools on how we can best support their physical and emotional safety and educational success.

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