Safety and Security

The Director of School Safety and Security has provided a safe school presentation to all teachers, trained School Resource Officers in See Something, Say Something and provided Stop the Bleed training to administrative staffs and teachers. Additionally, the director continues to present safety and security information at PTO meetings upon request at schools. There is regular bus driver training and a more rigorous training for substitute teachers and temporary employees. School administrators participated in a Safety and Security Symposium, which included an active shooter demonstration. Staff throughout the county have completed Stop the Bleed training, providing multiple people at each location who are ready to help others survive if there is a wait for emergency personnel.

CCPS requires two separate background checks for new employees, substitutes and temporary employees. All candidates complete an employment application, including references. New hires, including substitutes and temporary employees, are fingerprinted and also undergo a Social Security-based background screening, which complements our long-standing fingerprint screening. Fingerprints are submitted to the Criminal Justice Information System (CJIS), which searches both the Maryland and FBI databases. CCPS receives a report from CJIS typically within 3-5 business days. Starting with the 2019-20 school year, CCPS is requiring Social Security-based background checks for current employees. CCPS will randomly select about 1,200 employees per year, on a rotating basis, for the additional background.

“Evacuate” means moving students and staff from one place to another. Relocation could be to another area in the school or a predetermined outside site. Schools might evacuate if there is a fire, flooding or similar emergency that creates a potential hazard.

Sometimes it is necessary to clear a school hallway or outside area. In this instance, a principal might place the school on “hold,” meaning students stay in their classrooms, but business continues as usual. A principal can “hold” if a medical helicopter is landing on the school site due to a nearby accident or someone in the school needs medical attention and privacy while emergency services render aid.

CCPS uses communication to inform and educate to minimize fear and anxiety. The Communications Office has a crisis communication plan that guides how CCPS responds to parents, the media and social media inquiries during a high-profile incident or crisis. The plan is in place so that the community looks to CCPS first for accurate, complete information. During a crisis, we develop and send messages that keep our stakeholders — all of them — informed. Communications staff focus on gathering the most up-to-date information and providing clear and accurate information before releasing it to the public. We also coordinate with the Charles County Sheriff’s Office to ensure that the information shared is clear and consistent.

CCPS makes use of multiple communication channels, understanding that no one method of communicating works best for all. Here are some of the ways the school system connects: messages on the 24-hour information line, website notifications, emails and text messages through School Messenger, social media including Facebook and Twitter posts, and television announcements on Comcast Channel 96 and Verizon FiOS Channel 12. School emergencies or closings and delays are also communicated through the Charles County Citizen Notification Service (CNS).

When appropriate, the school system notifies Washington, D.C., metropolitan area radio and television stations, which are listed on Page 10 of the Parent Handbook/Calendar that is distributed to all students at the beginning of each school year.

“Lockdown” means doors are locked, lights are out and students and staff are out of sight in a locked room. A principal would lockdown a school if there is a threat or hazard inside the school building. Examples could include an angry person who runs past the office staff or a wild animal that gets into a building. During a lockdown, students and staff will stay out of sight and silent until police or other emergency responders clear the school of the threat.

Communication

In the event of an extended lockdown, parents can expect a message from the school district’s telephone notification system, School Messenger. Initial information will be preliminary. The school district will update parents when it receives new information from authorities. CCPS will follow up with a phone call, email and text when the lockdown is lifted, and with information as to where they can be reunited with their children. In a non-critical situation, CCPS will send an email. 

In a critical situation, CCPS will call, email and text parents. Please remember to check your child’s emergency contact information and make any necessary changes with the school. The numbers provided are the ones CCPS uses to contact parents in an emergency. Additionally, the school system posts emergency information on Facebook and @CCPS on Twitter.

Parent Advice

CCPS strongly encourages parents not to come to the school due to the potential risks and the additional safety hazards it creates for emergency personnel. Parents should only attempt to come to the school once the lockdown has been lifted and when the school has instructed parents to pick up their child(ren).  If a lockdown is due to a community event, the threat is eliminated once police activity is suspended.  In these instances, normal school schedules would resume and students would remain in school. 

In most cases, parents will be directed to a central meeting place where they can be reunited with their children. Parents should remember to bring your license, cell phone and keys. Staff will require identification for you to pick up your child.

Each school has a designated, offsite transfer location, usually within walking distance as well as a secondary site that may require transportation. Following an emergency, it is likely students will be at one of these sites. Please contact your child’s school to learn its designated transfer locations. 

Additionally, please do not call the school. Staff is unable to answer if the school is in a lockdown.

Accidents and emergencies are unpredictable, but CCPS trains its employees to respond calmly and immediately. Staff responds to a medical emergency involving staff or students by evaluating the situation to determine what assistance is needed. Students are kept away from the area. 

Each school has a school nurse who assists when needed and will begin first aid until paramedics arrive. If the emergency involves a student, a staff member gathers the student information, and someone remains with the student even if they are taken to the hospital.

Parent Advice

If your child is injured at school, the school administration will notify you. Staff will provide you with the type of illness and or injury as well as the medical care being administered. A staff member will accompany your child to any medical facility and wait until you or another emergency contact arrives before leaving. Please make sure your emergency contact information on file with your child’s school is up-to-date and that you have designated someone nearby to assist until you are able to join your child.

Charles County Public Schools (CCPS) provides a network of support for students in need of mental health services.

CCPS is addressing the mental health needs of our student population. The school system has invested both in increasing staff and adding programs to address mental health concerns of our student population. CCPS services include:

• 79 school counselors who provide both individual and group counseling, and classroom lessons on topics ranging from bullying and harassment to social skills development.
• 39 school psychologist positions who provide individual and group counseling, behavioral consultation, suicide and threat risk assessments, and staff presentations on topics such as verbal de-escalation techniques for teachers.
• 21 pupil personnel workers who provide family consultation and community resources to families, such as Community Conferencing available in some of our school zones.

• Tri-County Youth Services Bureau counselors are in all CCPS schools to provide individual and group counseling, family consultation and staff presentations. CCPS just received grant funding for this school year to add Tri-County counselors to every high school. Currently, we have 24 Tri-County counselors across all of CCPS’s buildings, with an additional position set to begin.

• Center for Children has a counselor at Thomas Stone High School and John Hanson Middle School one day a week each to provide additional individual and group counseling to students.  Center for Children is also looking to place an additional counselor at Maurice J. McDonough High School and General Smallwood Middle School.
• Staff provides training on concepts such as Adverse Childhood Experiences (ACEs), behavioral de-escalation techniques and restorative practices are being expanded to all school buildings. 

Jason Stoddard
Director of School Safety and Security
jstoddard@ccboe.com
301-392-5550

The director of school safety and security is responsible for developing a school system safety and security plan, executing the plan and serving as advisor to the Superintendent of Schools and other school personnel on school safety, collaborating with the School Resource Officers to provide daily school-based policing, safety and crime prevention.  

Mr. Stoddard has 24 years of law enforcement experience, including serving as a school resource officer.

Before joining the sheriff’s office, Stoddard served as a security police officer with the U.S. Air Force between 1994 to 1998. Between 1998 and 2007, Stoddard’s assignments with the sheriff’s office included patrol operations, criminal justice instructor, school resource officer, crime prevention, community policing, Explorer advisor and Joint Terrorism Task Force.

Stoddard served as a sergeant in the patrol division between 2007 and 2012. He was promoted to lieutenant in 2012 and worked as commander of the special operations sections and commander of the northern patrol division before being assigned in 2017 as commander of the homeland security and intelligence section.

Stoddard has served as a peer reviewer and assessor for the Department of Justice and a senior faculty member with the Leadership Development Institute of the Maryland Police and Correctional Training Commission. He holds numerous certifications and has been presented the annual Sheriff’s Award four times, awarded as Police Officer of the Year by the Greater Waldorf Jaycees, and presented a Bronze Medal of Valor from the sheriff’s office for showing exceptional courage at unusual personal risk in capturing five armed subjects. Most recently, Stoddard received a Governor’s Award for outstanding work in helping to create the Charles County Sheriff’s Office Citizens Police Academy.

Stoddard holds a Master of Arts in Organizational and Executive Leadership from Liberty University and a Bachelor of Science in Criminal Justice from the University of Maryland, University College.

Internal Affairs

Two experienced investigators lead investigations and provide guidance when there is an incident or accusation involving a CCPS employee. The types of internal affairs investigations include drugs and alcohol in the workplace, violations, weapons, criminal conduct and threats, harassment and bullying, and failure of an employee to self-report a criminal arrest within five days.

Often, the most important piece of safety and security is obtaining key information before someone makes the decision to commit a harmful act. Receiving tips and information in advance of anything happening allows CCPS to investigate and take proactive steps to prevent harm from occurring. If something does not look, sound, or feel right, we encourage people to report the concern.

• There are a number of ways to anonymously report concerns. CCPS provides a See Something, Say Something reporting website. Anyone can file a report, and the site includes an anonymous reporting tool.
• CCPS maintains a See Something, Say Something tip line. Call 301-302-8305 and leave a message. The hotline is checked daily, Monday through Friday.
• Maryland provides the Safe Schools Maryland Tip Line, an anonymous reporting system used to report threats to the safety and/or well being of students. The number is 833-MD-B-SAFE.

Student Crime Solvers

Students in every Charles County middle and high school can anonymously report crimes through a Student Crime Solvers program. Started in 2007, Student Crime Solvers allows students to keep their schools safe by anonymously reporting crimes or school violations. Like Crime Solvers, students can earn cash rewards for tips. The Board of Education endorses the program, which has helped solve hundreds of cases and paid students thousands in rewards.

In an actual emergency where students need to be evacuated from their school, parents will be directed to a central meeting place where they can be reunited with their children. Parents should remember to bring their driver’s license, cell phone and keys. Staff will require identification for parents to pick up their children.

College of Southern Maryland (CSM) and CCPS have partnered to provide a reunification site for students and staff in case of an emergency. CSM has agreed to allow CCPS to use its Physical Education (PE) Building, parking lots and access roads on the La Plata campus to house and operate a family reunification center during a crisis. Reunification is the process the school system would use to communicate with parents and to reunite them with their children following a disaster or large-scale emergency at a school. Reunification centers are set up away from the crisis situation to provide parents a secure place to go to find information about their children and to expedite the release of students.

Grants are helping CCPS make schools safer. CCPS has secured more than $1 million in grant funding to enhance school safety and security. Nearly $240,379 of the funding will go toward the expansion and enhancement to mental health services. The Maryland Center for School Safety has awarded CCPS with $374,576 to expand mental health services as well as implement student identification cards, expand Restorative Practice training, add bus cameras, provide SRO training and launch red light school bus enforcement.

The state also allotted CCPS $90,270 from a heroin and opioid grant to provide outreach, printing and marketing, NARCAN trainer kits, speakers, vehicle wrap displays and substitute coverage for professional staff development.

SROs will complete threat assessments at each CCPS building through a School Safety Survey grant. The state allotted CCPS $66,300 to complete this new mandate.

Physical enhancements, such as public safety radios, door locks and hardware, and window film will be funded through an Interagency Committee on School Construction School Safety grant of $292,000.

Plans

Each school has the emergency plans. The plans provide basic guidelines and procedures for staff to follow in the event of an emergency. Principals provide staff members with information about the plans and their individual responsibilities in the event of an emergency. CCPS updates, reviews and revises school plans annually.

Drills

CCPS practices safety. Annually, students must complete 27 drills, including evacuation/fire drill where students and staff are led to the closest and safest way out of a building, reverse evacuation drills, lockdown and lockout, shelter.

Surveillance Cameras

CCPS has 1,216 cameras. Every school or building has interior and exterior cameras. The number of cameras at a school or building varies based on square footage, the layout of the school, server capacities and requests due to reported past activities or incidents.

The CCSO School Resource Unit assigns one officer to every high school and middle school in Charles County as part of an agreement with Charles County Public Schools (CCPS). The officers work closely with the administrative staff and teachers to enhance school safety and address security matters. The officers also develop rapports with students and present programs in class that encourage good decision making, build self-esteem, and teach students to be positive role models in the community. In the event of a disturbance at the school, the officers are able to quickly intervene. In addition to fulfilling their responsibilities at their respective high school or middle school, School Resource Unit officers also work with elementary schools to address security matters and present student programs.

The programs School Resource Unit officers present to CCPS students include Drug Abuse Resistance Education (DARE) and Truth and Consequences. They help coordinate We Care, a program that has reduced teen traffic fatalities by using innovative methods to encourage young motorists to drive safely. Each summer, the officers also host a three-on-three basketball tournament, Badges for Baseball, a Just Say No camp and the Summer Youth Program. The School Resource Unit also operates a Student Crime Solvers program, which offers students an opportunity to receive reward money when the students anonymously submit information about crimes in schools.

During a “secure,” teachers and students stay inside and lock all outside doors. A principal might place a school in secure if there is a threat or hazard — such as a police search — outside of the school building. For students, this means if they are outside, they return to the inside of a building and instruction continues as usual. No one is allowed in or out of the building during a secure.

Communications

A secure can last for minutes to hours. If a secure goes beyond 30 minutes, the school system will notify parents by email of the situation. Another email, and possibly a phone call, will follow when authorities lift the secure or if new information becomes available. 

This is a good time to check the emergency contact information you have on file with your child’s school. The school district notification system uses the latest information provided by parents to contact them during a secure. The CCPS Communications Department will also use social media — Facebook and Twitter — to provide information.

Parent Advice

We know for many parents that the first instinct is to rush to the school to check on your child. However, during a secure, school staff will not open its doors to anyone, even if they know you. This action is to keep your child safe. Please do not come to the school or call the school, as the phone lines need to be open for police or other authorities to communicate with school administrators.

If there is a tornado warning, hazmat or other threat to personal protection, the school will ask students and teachers to “shelter.” Shelter requires students to evacuate to a shelter area and seal the rooms. Students practice for different shelter events, including earthquakes, as part of their annual drills.

Local businesses are giving Charles County Public Schools (CCPS) students incentives to keep track of their student ID badges out of school by providing discounts for services and products.  Read more about the student ID badge incentives. 

The following businesses have agreed to provide incentives for students who show their student ID badges:

• AMC St. Charles Towne Center 9 – Special student ticket discounts prior to 4 p.m.
• AMF Waldorf Lanes - Buy one game get one game free
• Blue Crabs - $10 tickets for students 13 and over; $8 tickets for students 12 and younger
• Buffalo Wild Wings – 10 percent off student entrée
• Burger King (all locations) – Free regular drink with purchase of a sandwich at locations in Charles and St. Mary’s counties
• Dunkin Donuts (all locations) – 10 percent off student orders
• Foster’s Grille (all locations) – 10 percent off student entrées
• The Greene Turtle – 10 percent off student meals (Dine-in only. Offer cannot be combined with any other offer, discounts or Greene Turtle Rewards and does not include beverages)
• Hancock Family Farms– 5 percent off total bill
• Island Music – 10 percent off all accessories
• Jersey Mike’s – Student discount on menu items
• Sky Zone – Monday through Thursday pay for 60 minutes get 90 minutes. Also offering special nights for schools with Glow Night opportunities
• Sonic (all locations) – 10 percent off with student ID
• Vocelli Pizza (all locations) – 10 percent off student order
• Wendy’s (La Plata only) – 10 percent off entrée
• Wireless Junkies - $10 off any repair & 10 percent off accessories
• World Gym (all locations) – One month for $45 - normally $59; three months for $119 - normally $159. Teen Sports Camps for ages 15-18, offered once a week, $99 a month and drop-in rates available.

DISCLAIMER

CCPS reserves the right to reject the inclusion of any business or incentive on this list at any time and for any reason, including any business or incentive that promotes the use of alcohol, drugs or tobacco, or any other product or service deemed inappropriate for our students.  While CCPS attempts to inform our students of all appropriate offers and incentives in our community, no business has the right to be included on the list, even if the business offers its own incentives.  CCPS does not endorse any business or incentive on this list, does not guarantee the accuracy or provision of the incentives listed, and does not accept liability or responsibility for the actions of or services or products offered by the businesses.  The businesses included on this list may end or change the terms of any offered incentive at any time, and CCPS reserves the right to remove any business from this list that is no longer offering or honoring the incentive.

Charles County Public Schools (CCPS) uses ScholarChip, a visitor management system that allows us to know who is in our schools. The system uses automated driver’s license scanning and has comprehensive, up-to-date sex offender information. The system helps schools better register visitors while maintaining a history of anyone who has checked-in or checked-out of the building.

Additionally, all visitors are required to show a photo identification prior to entering the building. This includes CCPS staff, who must show their employee photo identification badge. School staff also may ask the nature of the school visit prior to allowing a visitor to enter the building. Please be patient with school staff as they have been asked to verify the identity of all visitors. Visitor management is an extension of the school system’s work to secure the entrance to our schools.

Weather presents challenges both during and after the school day. The school system monitors the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) weather radio tone-alert system. Charles County’s location makes it susceptible to hurricanes, tornados, flooding and more. The main goal in making weather-related decisions is student and staff safety. 

Students practice regularly for different types of severe weather conditions. If weather conditions pose a potential hazard to students, school officials may dismiss students early, delay the opening of schools or close schools for the day. If conditions require the closing or delayed opening of schools, decisions are usually made by 5 a.m. A delayed opening permits buses to operate under safer conditions after traffic has diminished and roads are salted and/or cleared. Buses run routes one or two hours later than scheduled. 

If there is a one-hour delayed opening, morning prekindergarten classes start one hour late. If schools open two hours late, morning prekindergarten classes are canceled. If it is necessary to close schools during the day, CCPS attempts to make an announcement by 10:30 a.m. Morning prekindergarten students will remain at school, be served a lunch (cost to be reimbursed by parents) and will ride the bus or walk home at the scheduled dismissal time. 

Afternoon and evening meetings and activities are canceled if schools close early, or are closed for the day. If hazardous weather is predicted for later in the evening, afternoon activities may be allowed and evening activities may be canceled. Afternoon activities are those that end by 6 p.m. Evening activities begin at 6 p.m. or later.

Communication

Once notified of a closing or delay decision, the Communications Department works to notify the school community immediately. In addition to contacting local media, information is sent via email to parents with email addresses on file with CCPS, text messages for anyone who has opted in for the service, Facebook, Twitter, the 24-hour information line, the Charles County Public Schools website, and the Citizens Notification System (CNS). 

Decisions are made by 5 a.m.; however, depending on the circumstances, decisions could be made earlier or changed later in the day. No notification is made if schools are operating on a normal schedule. There is a daily operating status in the upper right-hand corner of the website.

Drills and Education

All students participate in drills throughout the school year including fire, evacuation, reverse evacuation, shelter (severe weather), lockdown, lockout and special needs.