Public safety courses coming to Lakewood

Sampson County Schools’ Career Technology Education (CTE) is bringing in a new public safety program for the 2024-25 school year, and it’s replacing the previous carpentry program that CTE was offering for the Lakewood High School students.

“The Public Safety program will replace the carpentry pathway at Lakewood High School,” CTE Director John Goode told the county Board of Education at a recent meeting.

Goode noted that Lakewood had been “searching for qualified instructors for its carpentry program three times in the last five years.” And when the latest instructor announced that they were leaving in October 2023, the school began searching for yet another new teacher.

It was only in April, after the school could not find a qualified candidate for six months, that they decided to close the carpentry program.

“When the most recent carpentry instructor announced that he would be leaving Lakewood High School in October 2023, the school immediately advertised the vacancy and began searching for a new instructor,” Goode stated. “The decision to close the carpentry program was made in April 2024 after the vacancy had been posted for six months and no qualified candidates had expressed an interest in the position.”

That is when Goode made the decision to replace the carpentry program with something new. And, at the May 21 Sampson County Board of Education work session, he brought a Memorandum of Understanding between CTE and the Sampson County Sheriff’s Office to the board. The MOU was to solidify the partnership between CTE and the Sheriff’s Office in order to create a public safety program for the school.

According to the memorandum, the Sheriff’s Office will “work closely with the school system to ensure that courses are aligned correctly” and that “assessments are appropriate for the specialized course of study.”

The MOU states that the Sheriff’sOffice will also provide consultation and assistance to the program while also providing training for the Sampson County Schools’ instructors who will be responsible for teaching the class.

“We are excited that Sampson County Schools is helping to develop and mentor the future public safety through this new curriculum. It is our hope the program will entice students to pursue a future career in public safety. This will benefit not just the Sheriff’s Office, but other public safety fields as well,” Sheriff’s Lt. Marcus Smith said.

The board approved the MOU, and now CTE is working toward making that program a reality for next school year.

But this decision did not come out of nowhere.

In 2022 and 2023, Sampson County Schools CTE sent out a career interest survey for their students to fill out. The results from that survey showed that students had a strong interest in careers in public safety.

With those results in mind, Goode started working on putting a program into place.

“Since Sampson Community College already has a Fire Academy, our plan is for the public safety program at Lakewood High School to focus on the Law & Justice and Emergency Management pathways. This would prepare students for the Community Emergency Response Team (CERT) and National Basic 911 Dispatch certifications,” Goode said in an email.

Students enrolled in CTE will have the opportunity to take Public Safety I in the fall, but the program will eventually expand to include more courses.

“Beginning this fall, students at Lakewood will have the opportunity to enroll in Public Safety I. The program will eventually expand to include the following course offerings: Public Safety II, Law & Justice I, Law & Justice II, Emergency Management I, and Emergency Management II,” Goode said in the press release.

The North Carolina Department of Public Instruction CTE Public Safety course pathway said Public Safety I is “the prerequisite, or introductory level class, that would be required before a student could enroll in more specialized courses.”

According to a press release from Valarie Newton, director of Communications and Family Engagement for Sampson County Schools, the program allows students the “opportunity to earn credentials or certifications that would allow them to enter the workforce as security guards, traffic safety officers or 911 dispatchers straight out of high school.”

Goode said the certifications earned will “serve as the student’s Proof of Learning for the course.” He also said that they “function in much of the same way an end-of-course exam does for a Math I or English II course” by serving as a “measure of student proficiency.”

The MOU will go into effect July 1 and last until June 30, 2027. The MOU will have to be renewed at the end of each term as long as the program is viable.