Las Vegas Review-Journal (Sunday)
CCSD Police report drop in calls for violent crime
This story was posted on lasvegassun.com at 2 a.m. today.
Calls for violent crime were down about 10% overall in the Clark County School District to start the academic year, according to data from school police.
School police took 1,818 calls for violent incidents in August and September, compared to 2,014 calls for the same time frame in 2021. The biggest drops were in fights and harassment and threats, the data shows.
Some calls, however, ticked upward, namely in assault and battery and child abuse and neglect.
It’s worth noting that not every call that police respond to is substantiated. Sometimes reports are closed without follow-up as “gone on arrival,” unable to locate” or “unfounded.”
Also, dispatch logs show where the calls originated, but not necessarily the incident. If an off-campus incident is reported to a school staffer who reports it to police, the call will show as coming from that school.
Violence — from threatening social media posts to brawls to attacks on teachers — gripped CCSD campuses last year as students returned to school fulltime after more than a year of pandemic shutdowns.
Juvenile justice and school officials, however, acknowledged real increased frequency and intensity last year — and that was before a 16-year-old student at Eldorado High School student was arrested in April for allegedly sexually assaulting and attempting to kill a teacher in her classroom after school.
The district has responded to last year’s violence surge with continuing multimillion-dollar investments in hardening campuses with fencing, secured entrances and surveillance cameras, starting with high schools in the valley’s urban core. CCSD also outfitted staffers around the district with wearable “instant alert systems” to allow them to call for immediate assistance or lockdowns, and officials have pledged to crack down on offenders with harsher discipline.
The Sun compared calls for the first two months of 2022-23 and 2021-22. Here’s what we found:
Harassment and threats: 620 in 2022; 764 in 2021
Fights: 373 in 2022; 551 in 2021 Assault and battery: 534 in 2022; 450 in 2021 Abuse and neglect: 222 in 2022; 152 in 2021 Sex assault: 37 in 2022; 58 in 2021
■ Robbery: 12 in 2022; 14 in 2021
■ Attempted robbery: 3 in 2022; 1 in 2021
■ Explosive device: 5 in 2022; 3 in 2021
■ Kidnapping: 1 in 2022; 2 in 2021
■ Attempted kidnapping: 3 in 2022; 1 in 2021
■ Totals: 1,818 calls in 2022; 2,014 calls in 2021
District surveying parents, staff, students
CCSD is collecting parent feedback for its annual districtwide survey on school climate.
Parents and guardians can log in to ccsd.net/survey for the survey, which is available in English and Spanish, until Dec. 16. The survey should take less than 10 minutes and it is also accessible from mobile devices.
In years past, it has asked parents how they agree with statements like “My child’s school sees me as a partner in my child’s education,” “My child’s school sets clear rules for behavior” and “The school building is clean and well-maintained.”
Several questions are campus-specific, so parents with multiple children can complete a survey for each child they have enrolled in the district. They must select either the name of the school or enter their child’s student ID number and birth date.
Surveys are also available at ccsd.net/survey for campus-based employees and students in grades 4 and up.
In an announcement when the survey went live this month, the district said the survey “is intended to provide information for the District and schools regarding the progress made toward CCSD priorities and to further improve our schools and increase parent/guardian engagement.”
Survey responses are aggregated and cannot be linked to any particular individual.
Aspiring teacher scholarships available
State-funded scholarships are now available for aspiring teachers.
The Teach Nevada Scholarship, which is administered by the Nevada Department of Education, will award up to $24,000 each to 220 more aspiring teachers who commit to teaching in Nevada public schools for five consecutive years. Winners must also agree to earn endorsements to teach English as a second language or special education, and spend at least three of their five years in a low-income, underperforming or high-vacancy school. It is not limited to CCSD placements.
Recipients will receive 75% of their award for their tuition, books and fees, and can receive the rest after their five years of service.
The scholarships are available to students enrolled in traditional and alternative routes to licensure teacher preparation programs. The Nevada Department of Education says that more than 900 teachers have taken advantage of the Teach Nevada Scholarship program since it was created in 2015.
Learn more at https://doe.nv.gov/educator_effectiveness/Educator_develop_support/Teach_nevada_scholarships/.
Purple Star Schools
The Nevada Department of Education honored four schools in Clark County this month for serving the needs of children from military families.
Raul Elizondo Elementary School and Mojave High School, which are in CCSD, received the state’s Purple Star School designation along with the private Lamb of God Lutheran School and the charter Coral Academy of Las Vegas-centennial Hills.
The honors recognize how schools support the educational and social-emotional needs of military-connected children, who move frequently and may feel the absence of a deployed parent. In the classroom, the students face challenges of an overlap in curriculum and changes in graduation requirements.
There are 1.1 million military-connected students at school throughout the state, according to the department. The average military families moves every one to three years, meaning a children could attend six to nine schools during their K-12 education, they said.
The honor is given twice a year to schools around the state. Twenty-five total schools have received the nod since the program started in 2021.