More Police placed in Toronto High Schools

"I think you'd have to be pretty stupid to commit a crime when there's a police officer present."

- Toronto Police Chief Bill Blair

Continue reading for my personal thoughts...


To be completely real, I know when I was a teen I would of hated the idea of uniformed police walking around the halls of my high school. I guess growing up I never grew to trust in the Toronto Police system, to this very day even when I’m completely innocent I feel unease and uncomfortable when I know police are around me. It’s funny that the people that make me feel uncomfortable are the ones hired to serve and protect. My uneasiness around the boys in blue throughout my life is probably due to a few reasons that I can think off the top of my head;

- Growing up my peers, rap songs, and many different movies depicted police as being crooked, not trust worthy, or racist.
- Throughout my adolescence to ‘’like’’ the police was never socially acceptable and you would probably be labelled a snitch.
- Personal encounters with the Toronto police during my adolescence definitely had a big influence on my views towards them, more negative than positive which only supported the belief that police were assholes.
- In high school most police I encountered or seen were Caucasian and for some reason or another I felt as if most of them didn’t like dealing with black youths.
- And one specific situation comes to thought; in my third year of high school a friend of mine was wrongfully shot and killed by a Toronto police officer, it always weighed on my mind.


Now that I have grown up a bit I have definitely had much more positive encounters with the Toronto Police, don’t get me wrong I still believe that many officers get corrupted through job experiences and take advantage of the power given to them but I must say I have met many good and reliable police officers. I believe that inserting uniformed officers in Toronto high schools will definitely decrease the level of violence and crimes within the schools. But I think that these officers that are being placed within the high school environment should be specially trained to deal with teens and young adults; they should be equipped with a unique sense of understanding and dealing with high schools students. Their goal should not only be to prevent violence and crime or to even protect but they should focus on growing relationships with students especially the ones that tend to cause more trouble than good. I thinki it's important for police to learn to understand today's youth and the youth need to learn to understand today's police. This will help demolish negative sterotypes and help mend a bad relationship between police and the cities youth.

Now thinking about it maybe if my high school had officers inserted within the educational environment and I was able to grow to know the people behind the uniform maybe I wouldn’t be so uncomfortable and unease around them today.

Word.