As the resource officer at UAHS for the past four years, Jon Rice has developed close relationships with students.
At first thought, the idea of having a resource officer in a high school may elicit notions of someone watching students closely, waiting to bust them for mischievousness
At least, that’s what some of the students, parents and staff at Upper Arlington High School thought when resource officer Jon Rice first took the job.
.“There was a lot of pushback initially,” Rice says. “I think the first idea people have of resource officers is … we lord over (students) and try to catch them doing bad things and start charging them … and I think that’s initially what it was packaged as.”
Fortunately for UAHS, and for Rice, the reality is much different from the stereotype.
Rice is now in his 11th year as a police officer in Upper Arlington, after working for the Fairfield County Sheriff’s Office for nearly 13 years as a patrol officer, detective, SWAT team member and sergeant.
Rice was drawn to UA when he saw how close-knit the community was – a change from what he had seen in Fairfield County.
“I love the community and people here, the support for law enforcement here is awesome,” Rice says. “A lot of the time, you don’t get that kind of support in a county, because it’s so much bigger and spread out. … There’s a big, broad spectrum of people there.”
In the four years he’s spent as a resource officer at UAHS – along with surveying football games, school dances and graduations – Rice has implemented new drug awareness and mental health education programs in health classes.
Revamping the mental health support programs has been an important project on a personal level for Rice, whose daughter struggles with anxiety.
“I added (a mental health presentation) because … there’s a lot of kiddos I see, they’re so stressed out … and it’s sad because kids don’t want to talk about it,” Rice says. “That kind of hits me personally, because my daughter, at age 14, got wracked with anxiety.”
In fact, a large part of his job has become taking the time to talk to kids and the parents of kids who are struggling. And talking, Rice says, is something that he’s more than happy to do.
“There’s times where I haven’t even gotten into my office, and there’s already people out here,” Rice says. “It’s just like round robin … but don’t get me wrong, I love to talk to them.”
Emily Real is a contributing writer. Feedback welcome at jwise@cityscenemediagroup.com.
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