School Resource Officers Build Community By Building Safety

By Chuck Keller, Contributor

I once read that “Without a sense of caring, there can be no sense of community.” There is a ring of truth there. And that level of caring is in Fort Thomas’ School Resource Officers (SRO), Zac Rohlfer and Chris Goshorn. 

Since the Columbine murders in 1999, schools and communities have been working to keep their communities safe. But SROs have been around in some form going back into the 1950s but the programs have been refined since the Colorado tragedy. 

In 2022 Kentucky House Bill 63 created an unfunded mandate requiring each school to have a designated school resource officer. In part, the state defines an SRO as “a sworn law enforcement officer who has specialized training to work with youth at a school site.” It also mandated a written contract between the school and local police agency. As a result, a School Resource Officer is now a specialized area of law enforcement.  As in any unfunded mandate, finding the money is an issue, but Fort Thomas handled the mandate by evenly splitting the cost between the city and the school.

Zac Rohlfer has been an SRO since 2018, well before the state requirement. Why was that? Rohlfer said, “I think the city saw that there was a lot of good that could come from it.“ Vision and commitment help to build community. 

Neither officer is assigned a specific school, but Goshorn has an office in the middle school and Rohlfer has an office in the high school, but then they split time to visit the elementary schools and even make time to visit the city’s Catholic schools. There is a lot to cover – names, faces, and geography – and it may appear a bit daunting. 

Rohlfer is the younger of the two SROs.  He grew up in the Colerain area, attended the University of Tennessee, Cincinnati State, and Indiana Tech. He’s been married for sixteen years and has two sons. He also enjoys, “Being out on the water, whether that’s kayaking, paddle boarding, boating, or fishing, I love them all. Working on traveling to all 50 states with my family, we hit 33 out of 50 this year.”  

Simply put, he really enjoys being a School Resource Officer. In fact, you feel his enthusiasm for it in conversation. Rohlfer said, “We are there to build relationships, build community” And that is key.  He spent time as an Academic Team coach at Woodfill but as his children grew so his time commitments changed but you will see him regularly at games and events. 

About being an SRO, Rohlfer said, “I just enjoy getting to be in the schools. I enjoy the environment. I enjoy helping the kids.” Is that part of being a dad? “Probably, I think I’ve always had a disposition to want to help people, I guess….It’s part of my nature.  He said, “We take safety seriously. We take our jobs seriously and our city has empowered us to do that.”

Zac Rolfer has an engaging personality. He’s quick with a smile and a kind word. “Chris and I thankfully mesh very well. He has a personality like mine, he is engaging. He truly cares about the kids….Because we’ve worked together for so long that when he came on as the second SRO, even though he’d been out of policing for a few years, it was like he’d never left.” In fact, Goshorn was well into his career when Rohlfer came on to the force and he acted as a bit of a mentor to Rohlfer. Now the roles have reversed a little bit as Goshorn looks to Rohlfer for some insight and guidance. They are equal partners in their oversight and care for students. 

Building relationships rewires a commitment of time but it’s always worthwhile. Rohlfer claims that an incident that may take ten minutes on the street with an adult may take all day with a student. There are so many variables. “Honestly, you got to try and figure out what is happening. It’s just that there’s so much more to it and that’s both frustrating and it’s rewarding.”   

Chris Goshorn is in his third year as an SRO but he is experienced in law enforcement. He retired from the city police force after 21 years, worked for the Northern Kentucky Drug Strike Force for over 6 years before returning to the city in his current roles. He brings 29 years of law enforcement knowledge and experience and he is a lifelong Fort Thomas resident so he knows the people, culture, and places.

Goshorn said, “The one thing I like best about my job is, and the thing that consumes more of my time than criminal investigations, is building relationships. And that’s what I love about it. I’m roaming the halls. I’m talking to students. I’m talking to teachers, talking to other staff members.”

He continued, “I argue that our primary job was to build community and build relationships, [then] education falls into place…. Once you have those relationships, then you are open to learning. And that’s what’s happening here.” And that is a good point to remember. 

Goshorn has been married for 18 years and they share four children, and he now has a granddaughter in the school. That was a motivating factor to become a School Resource Officer because he gets to see his granddaughter at school. He enjoys riding his motorcycle, fishing, and hiking. 

Students often recognize Officer Goshorn when he is off duty or during summer break. Students greet him and they chat. It’s all quite gratifying because, as he emphasizes, “that’s the point of building community.”

That’s the part that keeps me going every day because this past year was challenging. …But when I go home at the end of the day, I say, you know what, I’m hopefully steering this child in the right direction.“

An SRO is meant to be an aid to create a positive learning environment and these two officers certainly are doing that. They rehearse drills, procedures, teach classes, and act as a resource for class projects. They work with teachers, administrators, parents, and above all, students to build a community that looks out for each other, to learn, and become productive citizens. 

Helen Keller observed that, “Alone, we can do so little; together, we can do so much.” These are the kind of people we need in our schools.