Schools

Police Officer Earns 'A' For Work in Westborough Schools

The National Association of School Resource Officers and the National Road Safety Foundation presented Charles "Chip" Dapolite with their 2013 Innovation in the Classroom Award during the resource officers' July 16 national conference in Orlando.

Around prom time this spring, Westborough High School juniors and seniors will see a mock drunken driving crash.

Such school programs earned Westborough Police Officer Charles "Chip" Dapolite national recognition this summer.

The National Association of School Resource Officers and the National Road Safety Foundation presented Dapolite with their 2013 Innovation in the Classroom Award during the resource officers' July 16 national conference in Orlando, Fla.

"It's 'innovations in the classroom,'" said Dapolite, who begins his sixth year as Westborough's school resource officer.

"What they're looking for is ideas on how to make the students safer drivers."

Dapolite said he did his first mock crash in 2011.

The program is running every few years because "we don't want to send out the same message and have it not be as dramatic," he said.

Vision-impaired goggles are in their sixth year as one of Dapolite's tools with the seventh- and eighth-graders.

Dapolite said he always tells the students, "If this is what impairment is like when you're drinking, imagine if you're trying to drive. You can't even do it walking, let alone driving."

"They call it 'the drunk goggles.' It's something that they enjoy doing," said Dapolite, who added that the health teacher helps with this lesson.

Dapolite said he also works with freshmen, sophomores and juniors about "good decision making behind the wheel."

"It's just a fantastic avenue for me to help out," said Dapolite, who has spent 13 years total on the Westborough Police Department. He is primarily a patrol officer.

Dapolite said that last year, he started working with fifth- and sixth-graders on preparing for the AAA poster/media contest, where the theme is "safe driving and seat belt usage."

"Students learn from what they see," he said.

"They're very visual. And when they see us as adults driving erratically or driving inappropriately, they're aware of it."

They're learning from a Westborough High alum.

Dapolite graduated from WHS in 1988. He played on the soccer and basketball teams, and played drums in the band.

He said he tells students, "I understand where you're coming from because I was in your seat not too long ago."

The school resource officer's role has changed during Dapolite's five years in it.

"When I first started, it was all about being a role model for the students, being the communication between the police department and the school department. Unfortunately, through the Newtown shootings, it's thrusted into the spotlight (that) safety is now the number one priority. As I've been told many times by teachers, you can't teach in a classroom unless the students feel safe," he said
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Dapolite said that when he's in a school setting, he tries to "be visible and engage in conversations and listen to what they have to say. Every student that comes to me, I let them talk."

"I'll never lie to students," he said.

"That's when you lose their trust. I will tell them very often 'I can't tell you that' or 'won't tell you that.'"


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