Attorney general offers safety tips for students and parents

RALEIGH — Attorney General Roy Cooper offered tips to help parents get their children back to school safely and ready to learn as the traditional school year begins.

"Giving our children a safe and successful school year means more than buying the right pencils and backpacks," Cooper said. "A few simple steps can give parents some peace of mind so they can focus on helping their kids learn."

Cooper's office offers parents the following safety tips:

- Sign up to get e-mail alerts when a registered sex offender moves near your home or your child's school, day care or after-school activities. Visit the sex offender Web site, available at www.ncdoj.gov, to sign up for e-mail alerts, and encourage your child's school to sign up for alerts as well. You can also use the site to search for registered offenders and view maps and aerial photographs that pinpoint where they live.

- Check to make sure your child's school has a current safety plan. Ask if they've put together their Critical Incident Response Kit, which should contain everything a school needs to respond to a crisis, like blueprints, keys, rosters and emergency plans. Cooper's office helped distribute the kits to all North Carolina schools. Ask if teachers have been trained and what you should do as a parent if a crisis occurs at school. A list of schools that have put together their kits and provided training for teachers is available at http://www.ncdjjdp.org/cpsv/cirk.html.

- Make sure your child's school, day care and after school activities screen their employees. Visit and get to know the people who spend time with your children.

- Update your list of emergency contacts and give a current copy to your child's school and any after school programs. Make sure that everyone on your contact list knows key information, such as how to get to your child's school, your pediatrician's name and number, alarm codes for your house, etc.

- Ask the school to notify you if your child doesn't arrive at school, and let the school know who is authorized to pick up your child. Make sure your children know who would pick them up in case of an emergency or if you aren't able to.

- Make sure young children know their full name, parent's name, address and phone number. You may also want to consider getting an ID card from the N.C. Division of Motor Vehicles for your child to carry.

- Be careful to protect your child's identifying information, like Social Security numbers, from strangers. Identity thieves will use an unsuspecting child's information to open credit lines, take out mortgages or acquire credit cards without parents' knowledge. Only give identifying information when necessary, and when you do, ask how it will be used and how the organization plans to protect the information.

- Talk to your kids about how to stay safe from strangers, even on the Internet. Set ground rules for Internet use, agree on Web sites that are OK to visit and explain what is appropriate or not to do or view online. Easy- to-use tools that can help you protect your children online, including a video and resource guide, are available free from Cooper's office at www.ncdoj.gov.

- Consider carefully the age and maturity of your children before deciding to let them use social networking sites. If you decide to allow it, be sure to read the site's safety tips, use its privacy settings, and provide extra supervision. Also, talk to teens about how social networking sites can cause problems if people post inappropriate messages and embarrassing photos or respond to scams.

- Talk to school staff about Internet safety, too. Computers can be a wonderful learning tool, and many children now have access to the Internet in classrooms and school libraries. Ask your child's school how they protect their students when they go online, and let them know that Internet safety tools for teachers are also available at www.ncdoj.gov.

- Encourage your children to talk to you about anything that makes them feel scared or uncomfortable. Teach your kids which trusted adults (such as grandparents, teachers, school resource officers, a neighbor you know and trust) they can also turn to when they need help.