The Cobourg Police Service strives to ensure that our approach to policing, and the services we provide, reflect the community’s needs. As part of our commitment, we are proud to be working with C.R. Gummow Public School in order to launch a new in-school program, called CAPES.
It is important for police to develop and establish lasting connections with youth in the community for crime prevention, and to break down barriers between the public and the police. An essential location for police to connect with youth is in our schools.
CAPES, which stands for Cops and Partners Engaging Students, is an in-school program aimed at teaching personal safety and healthy choices at the elementary school level.
Police, along with community partner organizations, deliver programming to children at every grade level from Kindergarten to Grade 8 on various topics such as healthy decisions, stranger danger, personal safety, nutrition, drugs and alcohol, healthy relationships, bullying, online safety, train safety, and bike safety.
This program delivers important messages about safety and crime prevention, as well as helping children to develop positive connections with police and other social service agencies. The programming fits in well with the school curriculum and targets emerging issues that police see in our youth community on a regular basis.
While staff members at C.R. Gummow Public School are looking forward to launching this pilot program, in partnership with the Cobourg Police Service, the program will be made accessible to both public and Catholic elementary schools throughout the Town of Cobourg.
“We have been working with the Cobourg Police Service for several months to launch this program, and we are excited to be part of the pilot project,” says Mary Ellen French, Principal of C.R. Gummow PS.
“It is an important part of our Safe, Caring and Restorative schools program planning, and we are pleased that it has a direct connection to the Ontario Health Education curriculum.
“Cobourg Police officers will be here for seven days, starting April 4, to deliver five workshops on various safety topics to every class,” she adds. “Appropriately, we have scheduled all of the bullying prevention workshops for all grades on April 11, the Day of Pink.”
Any questions may be directed to the Cobourg Police Service Community Engagement and Response Team (CERT), by calling 905-372-6821.
Author: Pete Fisher
Has been a photojournalist for over 30-years and have been honoured to win numerous awards for photography and writing over the years. Best selling author for the book Highway of Heroes - True Patriot Love
