Spotlight on Campus Safety Workload, Responsibilities
Keeping tabs on eight shifting computer screens and manning two ringing telephones simultaneously while a person asks for assistance at the service window—this is what a typical eight hour shift looks like for Officer Peter DelMastro, a Campus Safety dispatcher. On the other end of the radio is his partner for the day, Officer Lauri Winter, who drives around the 673-acre campus alone, responding to each call as it comes in.
“I look at Campus Safety as being facilitators. We facilitate to provide a safe environment for students to learn, the teachers to teach and the staff to carry on their duties,” Gravel said.
According to Director of Campus Safety Services and Risk Management Paul Gravel, Campus Safety is “the only service-oriented group that’s warranted 24/7” through the entire calendar year. On a daily basis, Campus Safety personnel manage an extensive scope of tasks that include transferring all phone calls made to the Academy, making nightly rounds, monitoring all campus buildings and responding to any calls for service concerning medical emergencies, technical malfunctions and access to campus facilities. “I look at Campus Safety as being facilitators. We facilitate to provide a safe environment for students to learn, the teachers to teach and the staff to carry on their duties,” Gravel said.
Gravel elaborated on the amount of ground Campus Safety has to cover, adding that the department received 32,000 calls last year. “We always make service our priority. We don’t say, ‘oh, that’s a key service that can wait.’ But an officer may be down at the boat house with an open door…when a student that didn’t bring their keys with them is waiting to get into their room. Obviously, emergencies come first. In most instances, there’s only one patrol officer that’s on, covering 174 buildings on 1,000 acres,” he said.
Campus Safety has been severely understaffed in previous school years, which made it necessary for personnel to take extra shifts and have, at times, “a 75 or 80 hour work week” according to Winter. To fill these positions and hire officers that can manage the numerous tasks listed in the job description, Gravel explained that he worked with Director of Human Resources Rachel Henry to streamline the hiring process. “If we get a candidate in and we liked them on paper, we’re going to pull them in for an interview right away instead of the old school entire day of interviews and then making a decision from there,” Gravel said. “If they look good after their first interview, we’ll start the process.”
Henry added that the transition from paper to an online platform for the applicant tracking system and the introduction of a time differential for additional shifts also made the hiring process more efficient and improved the work environment.
Interim Chief Financial Officer Marijka Beauchesne explained the monetary aspects of hiring new people. “About 70 percent of the Academy budget supports wages and benefits, and we oversee the budget closely to ensure fiscal responsibility and operational efficiency,” Beauchesne said. “Our Director of Compensation is specialized in reviewing market data to support our pay policy, which endeavors to pay at the 60th percentile of competing employers.”
Gravel emphasized that another important part of the candidate assessment is determining how they will fit in with the department dynamic. “They have a chance to explore if we are a good fit for them and they a good fit for us. We’re a pretty small team, like a little family, so we want to make sure the people we hire will be able to fit in with us and that the personalities match,” he said.
Winter elaborated on the importance of trusting coworkers, especially in emergency-oriented lines of work. “When you work in emergency services, whether it’s fire department or police or some other aspect of that, you learn that when you have your core group, you have to depend on them,” she said. “You have to know that person is going to respond to you if you get into trouble, and so you tend to bond really fast, especially working crazy hours on overnight shifts.”
According to Winter, the supportive work atmosphere, evident in her strong personal connections to her coworkers, is what makes coming to work enjoyable. “[Campus Safety] is like my second family. There’s nothing I wouldn’t do for those guys, and I know there’s nothing they wouldn’t do for me. I spend more time with them than my other family,” she said.
Campus safety officers wish to extend this close-knit community beyond their fellow staff members to the Exeter student body. Pixley and Gravel have already begun to foster conversations with Exonians through dorm duty. “[Dorm duty] allows us to meet the students one-on-one,” Gravel said. “We love it because we can joke with the guys who are in Soule, and when we see them across campus, we can yell back and forth at each other. They’ll come sit with us when we’re doing dorm duty at night and ask us questions. We want the students to get to know us, not just somebody that comes and unlocks the door.”
For many staff members, interacting with students is a favorite part of the job that makes their work enjoyable and rewarding, despite the demanding schedule. “I’ve been here for ten years, and this is by far my most favorite job. I love the community. I adore the students,” Winter said. “And when the world gives me great doubt about what the future is going to be like, I come here for a couple of days, and I know we’re going to be okay.”