CAA Manitoba is celebrating 90 years of its School Safety Patrol program. To mark the occasion, safety patrollers gathered at the Manitoba Legislative Building on Monday for a day full of activities, including a tour of the building, meeting with politicians and participating in the Speaker’s March. According to CAA, the day was about celebrating the young volunteers who have stepped up to help their peers with pedestrian and road safety. “The fact is [these students] do give back to their communities,” said CAA Manitoba’s Teresa Di Felice. “They contribute to the community safety, keeping their classmates safe; they take on leadership and responsibility, and I think the legislature is representative of all of those things.” CAA Manitoba’s School Safety Patrol program started in 1936 at Winnipeg’s Greenway School. Within months, the program expanded to schools across the city. Currently, there are about 8,000 patrollers at 250 schools around the province. “This program is just as important today as when it was started 90 years ago,” De Felice said. “The reality is that kids are getting to school through different ways and our stats say that about 43 per cent of parents are driving their kids to school every day… Keeping those school zones safe is the most important thing.” The School Safety Patrol program is geared towards students in Grades 5 to 8. The initiative involves training the young patrollers to model and encourage safe behaviours among their fellow students. It also includes monitoring school crossings and helping bus drivers transport students to and from school in a safe manner.
