Charlottesville City Schools

Since the removal of SROs from our safety model in 2020, we have seen many successes, but there have also been challenges. The decision to return SROs to our schools in August 2026 has focused on four main “pain points” of our current model:

• Educators must handle responsibilities traditionally managed by police.
• Schools rely on available police officers instead of specially selected and trained officers who work onsite to build relationships with school staff, students, and families.
• School staff face administrative burdens to call, brief, and schedule police when assistance is needed.
• In critical situations, an officer is not already on site.

Our safety model focuses on:

• Community-building and relationship-building. We hope even in these first weeks of school, our students are already starting to feel a sense of welcome and belonging in our schools.
• Mental health supports. The number of mental health professionals in our schools far exceeds state requirements and other schools’ averages. Our qualified counselors, social workers, and psychologists are available to meet the needs of students and families. 
• Care and Safety Assistants (CSAs). CSAs are Charlottesville Schools employees who are certified school safety officers trained in areas such as de-escalation, youth mental health first aid, safety procedures, and more. They work at CHS, CMS, Walker, and Lugo-McGinness Academy.
• Community partnerships, including with the police. Even with our current safety model, police are regularly in our schools to address state-required tasks and needs. Beginning in August 2026, school resource officers will return to our schools.
• Building upgrades and security practices. Recent building upgrades include expansions to door access control systems, improvements to school lobbies, and more. At ticketed public events, we also follow safety practices such as requiring clear bags and using metal detectors at events with an expected attendance of 250+.
• Staff training and school-wide drills. We train staff and students in how to respond to unusual situations, from a medical incident to a fire alarm.

The plan is to have SROs based in our high school and middle school in August 2026. This fall, we are seeking feedback on this draft agreement with the police (the MOU, or Memorandum of Understanding). We are also working to develop the Standard Operating Procedures to further guide day-to-day interactions between SROs, school staff, students, and families. Based on the final agreement, the budget process begins (since SROs are police employees, we expect these expenses to be part of the City’s CPD budget). Then comes hiring and training to make sure we are ready to implement the program in August 2026.

In response to community feedback, we have revisited this question. The original recommendation for 4 came from the working group based on the staffing levels in place when Cville Schools had an SRO program in 2020 and from what we learned about the “youth resource officer” model in other communities who support young people both during school hours and in the community.

As of September 18, we now recommend 2 SROs, 1 at CHS and 1 at CMS. These officers would focus their attention on the needs of the schools during school hours. 

Reasons for this change:

• We understand and share the community’s concerns about costs; by reducing the number of SROs from 4 to 2, the Charlottesville Police Department will be able to staff these officers from their currently budgeted positions with no budgetary impact aside from the training of the officers (which can be absorbed in the professional learning budget of the police).
• This brings us in alignment with the SRO staffing at the high schools in Albemarle County (1 per school).
• If in the future, there appears to be a need to expand the number of SROs, we can make that decision using data and lessons learned from working with the two officers as “proof of concept.”

NOTE: Prior to September 18, the agreement originally called for two SROs based at Charlottesville High School, one based at the new Charlottesville Middle School, and an SRO supervisor to float among schools as needed.

The SROs will join – not replace – our much-loved CSAs and mental health professionals. We are keeping the other elements of our current safety model, which relies on: CSAs, mental health supports, positive school culture, common-sense building safety upgrades, and community partnerships.

The SROs are CPD employees, but Charlottesville City Schools will be part of the SRO selection process. Both parties acknowledge that the right “fit” – and the right training – are key to this program’s success.

SROs will complete all police training, and they will have extra courses to assure they understand how to work with youth in areas such as relationship-building, mental health awareness, de-escalation, restorative justice, and more. They will also be trained in school processes to make sure they understand how school staff promote a positive school culture and address everyday issues.

Yes – they are required for all sworn CPD officers. This is a national practice for SROs without exception. Having said that, officers will use safety harnesses designed to prevent accidental removal or usage of the gun.

This draft agreement rests on a shared commitment to restorative justice and avoiding criminal justice processes whenever possible. This agreement also is clear that SROs are not part of our student disciplinary process – they are there to promote safety while building relationships and completing safety-related tasks.

The Charlottesville Police Department and Charlottesville City Schools agree that the principal is the head of building. School administrators are the school employees who direct the work of the school SROs, except in true emergency situations.

SROs will not have access to the schools’ student information system. The draft agreement describes the circumstances when school staff can share information with the police.

We have been following all national developments as we created this draft MOU. Locally, Police Chief Kochis has stated that the CPD will not agree to assist federal entities such as ICE. As part of the MOU, either the CCS or CPD may terminate or pause this agreement at any time to remove SROs if local conditions or actions beyond local control create circumstances that conflict with the goals of the MOU.

In August and September, we are actively seeking feedback to make sure that this draft MOU reflects our community’s needs and values. You can complete a feedback form here. In addition, on August 26, we’ll co-host a community conversation moderated by Charles Lewis. We are also looking at other schools’ solutions for ways that staff, students, and families can share ongoing feedback (positive or negative) about our safety practices once SROs are back in the school. 

School administrators can report concerns at any time to the Sergeant for the SRO unit and/or notify CCS division administration. CCS division administrators have a close working relationship with our CPD liaison to address concerns that impact our school community and the community at-large. In addition, the MOU calls for quarterly performance review meetings & reports.

All area school divisions that surround Charlottesville/Albemarle have SRO programs. Harrisonburg, Lexington, Staunton, and Waynesboro have SROs.

A number of school districts like ours removed their SROs around the year 2020, but many of those school districts – including Albemarle and Alexandria in Virginia – have subsequently restored SROs to their safety model. 

Like us, they are finding that adding supports in areas like mental wellness or their own trained safety officers do not meet the need for accomplishing state-required, police-specific tasks.

School staff have worked to optimize our safety current safety model by trying many approaches:

• For building upgrades or safety procedures: We refined our response protocols and  invested over $1.8 million to enhance school vestibules, add security cameras, upgrade door access control systems, implement a virtual hall pass system for better hallway management at CHS; update visitor policies/systems; expand safety training for staff; and more.
• For non-SRO staffing: We doubled our mental health staffing and developed the team of Care and Safety Assistants. We added additional CSA positions; we created a supervisor of safety and security position. CPD trained additional officers in school threat assessment protocols (a state-required national best-practice for evaluating threats).
• For communications systems: We have invested in additional radios for schools and experimented with dedicated security cell phone lines specifically for staff communication with police, but we have not found a substitute for having the trained individuals on-site who carry both school and first responder radios and are integrated with both the school and first responder communities and protocols. 
• For overall evaluation of our safety model: We have regularly sought advice from the state level (and from school safety experts at UVA, the state, and elsewhere). At the Board’s request, in 2024, we hired a firm to conduct a safety audit of our approach. Among their findings was a recommendation to restore School Resource Officers.

We have given regular updates to the Board since 2020 about these modifications.  In these Board presentations, staff have articulated that while important and positive, these additions do not address the key underlying issue: The school staff need to work with police on a daily basis, as required by the state. The lack of designated, specially selected, trained, and on site officers is an ongoing “pain point” in our safety model.

We have received useful, detailed feedback about the MOU (from the Aug. 26 event and the online survey). Our initial reaction is that we can incorporate most of this feedback into the MOU or, more likely, the Standard Operating Procedures. This page contains more information about the specific areas where the work group is actively working to make adjustments.

We also heard that some people are dissatisfied with both the Board’s decision-making process and the decision itself. (We’ve heard from others who support the decision.)

We’ve heard people want more opportunities for the community, staff, and students to follow and give input on the refinement of the MOU and the SOP, so we have scheduled  about 15 events in September and October, including weekly “SRO Info Hours” in September and October to give updates, hear feedback, and answer questions. List of dates/times/locations is on this webpage.
 

Recent and Next Steps:

• Summer 2025: Family Engagement with Disproportionately Impacted Communities
• August 7: Update about MOU Development to School Board
• August: Continued Student/Staff/Community Engagement about Draft MOU
  • August 26: Can I Talk to You Cville Event
• September 4: Update about MOU Finalization Process to School Board
• September/October: Finalization of MOU and Standard Operating Procedures, including weekly “Info Hours” for updates, questions, and feedback 
• Winter: City budget development (Update on September 18: with the reduction in the number of officers from 4 to 2, the Charlottesville Police Department will be able to staff these officers from their currently budgeted positions with no budgetary impact aside from the training of the officers (which can be absorbed in the professional learning budget of the police).
• Spring: Hiring and training of SROs
• August 2026: Schools open with school resource officers added to current safety model