Kyle Schneider’s marketing class at Pine Bush High School worked together on an interesting community project that spanned more than two months. The goal: to give input to the Town of Crawford Police Department that can help to expand their community outreach. Officer Pat Swayne, the school resource officer at the high school, first came to Mr. Schneider with the idea to get the marketing class involved.

An additional aspect to the project – provide some ideas to update the SRO vehicle.

The students dove into the project. They made suggestions to reach more teenagers by increasing their social media presence, creating a more positive image, including information about teen’s mental health issues, running fun events and including useful information and opportunities on the department’s website.

 

 

The students also suggested ways to accomplish the objective. They suggested cross-posting on other community  groups’ social media pages to get the word out about their events to a larger audience. They also suggested expanding the department’s social media presence to include platforms that students use, like Tik Tok.

Another suggestion was to collaborate with other businesses in town for events and promotions, showcase the dogs within the department on their social media (who wouldn’t love that!) and be responsive by providing feedback to as many comments and inquires as possible.

 

 

The students suggested the department provide its website in different languages for those who speak other languages and to promote its upcoming events on the website prominently and put flyers and posters around the community.

There were other suggestions – hold fundraising events like car washes, golf tournaments and sporting events, like a basketball game, to connect to the community more; and to support open houses to get community members to meet the officers and learn about the department and career opportunities.

When it came to the SRO car, the students suggested changing the lettering on the car to blue and gold, the Pine Bush school colors, and add the district logo onto the back window, among other things. All great ideas!

 

 

The class ended up doing a 15-page report, detailed with pictures, suggestions, and ways to enhance the community outreach for the Town of Crawford police. They also made a presentation to Chief Dominic Blasko, Sgt. Michael Mataraza, and SRO Swayne, who came to the class in December to learn of their findings and gave them a hard copy of the report.

“It was a great collaboration and realistic project for my business students,” said Mr. Schneider. “I hope they learned a lot from this experience.”