DPS Commissioner Santiago F. Tudela, represented by Police Operations commander Capt. Lawrence Camacho, said the department saw the need for additional certified officers to handle DARE training on island.
“There is only one police officer who is DARE certified on Saipan, and it is our aim to allow many students as we can to graduate from DARE,” Camacho said.
Currently, only Police Officer Isa Bokuku handles the training for the students of different schools.
“Four more DARE certified police officers can do a lot to help Officer Bokuku in this campaign and lighten her load,” Camacho said.
DPS has yet to name the four police officers who will be sent to Virginia
DARE board president and Dandan Elementary School principal Jonas Barcinas said that additional certified police officers will be educate more school children regarding crime, violence and illegal drugs in the community.
“The CNMI nowadays is in constant danger of the occurrence of theft, drug abuse and other crimes, and some cases have gotten so extreme that they have caused alarm in the community.” Barcinas said.
On Friday, 235 students from Hopwood Junior High School graduated from the program.
Created in 1983, DARE is a police officer-led series of classroom lessons that teaches children from kindergarten through 12th grade how to resist peer pressure and live productive drug and violence-free lives.
It is designed to be taught by police officers who have the proper training and experience to answer questions from students.
The officers will have to undergo 80 hours of special training in different areas such of classroom teaching and management and 40 hours of additional training for teaching high school curriculum.
