By Kayli Reese
The University of Iowa police are continuing their mission to expand community outreach with more students.Jonathan Ron, the security supervisor in the Department of Public Safety, said the overall goal of the department always is community policing by keeping students engaged in the work campus police are doing.
A big part of this goal, he said, involves the student security program, which the department wants more students to be involved in. Currently, Ron said, 75 students are involved in the program. By having students partake in the program, he said, an open channel of communication between students and the department is easy to access and free-flowing.
The students in the program, Ron said, work about 20 hours per week and are paid for their time. Most people work nights, to accommodate student schedules, he said. Not only does being a part of the program build résumés, he said, but students act as ambassadors for the department in a way.
“Especially on a campus, police should be considered part of the community,” Ron said. “[Officers] are here to serve, but we all must do it as one community.”
Ron also said by having more students participate, officials hope a more diverse student taskforce will be the result. This way, he said, the department will be able to better reach out to all parts of the student body at the UI.
UI sophomore Daisy Torres said she would like to go into law enforcement herself, and this is a good first step to that goal.
Some of the tasks she said she has done include night dorm checks, helping with special events, security checks at the Voxman Building, and even doing security work on storage units.
“Giving back to the community is really rewarding,” Torres said.
The officers are extremely helpful to the students, she said, and they take time to train each student. Also, she said knowing officers are around incase anything unexpected happens builds her confidence within her job.
UI senior Sarah Ingwersen said she has worked in her position for a little over a year. Her tasks, she said, include opening the museum, doing security bypass checks to make sure no one is bringing banned items into the museum, and ensure no one damages any artwork and respects the pieces. She said she also sometimes helps with special classes done at the museum and does administrative work.
In her job, she said, she has learned leadership skills. The training officers are extremely helpful, she said, and having the skills she obtained could drastically make a difference in someone’s life. For example, if a person needs CPR, she said she could be the split-second difference that could save that person.
Working in the student security program has also created a better understanding of the police, she said, and she feels the police also now have a better understanding of the students.
“[Officers] have a hard job. The law can sometimes tie officers’ hands,” Ingwersen said. “Whether the community likes it or not, officers have to respect the fair rights of a criminal. By working in security, we can put personalities to the stereotypes we all see.”
