28-02-2025
CHS students create Buddy Bags for police
Searching for community service ideas brought about a unique project for SkillsUSA students at Cleburne High School this school year.
A former corrections officer, Nathan VanRyn is the SkillsUSA leader advisor and law enforcement teacher. He proposed the idea of producing bags with sensory items for Cleburne Police Department officers, so if they responded to a call with a child present, specifically an autistic child, they could soothe them.
'Our school mascot is the Yellow Jacket,' he said. 'So, we decided to call them the Yellow Jacket Buddy Bags.'
VanRyn's students ran with the idea and began researching helpful items for interacting with children, especially when there is an altercation and police must enter a home.
'Interacting well with the children in these situations can make such a difference in how they deal with and interpret the situation, both now and in their futures ... especially in cases of domestic violence,' he said.
Inside the bags are noise-reducing headphones, sunglasses, fidget toys, a weighted blanket and communication cards for non-verbal children. The students created the cards themselves in Cava. Each card contained a picture and a word in Spanish and in English.
'So, if the child struggles to talk or understand and is scared, the police can use the items to distract, calm and communicate with them,' VanRyn said. 'They can point to the picture to help the officer understand how he or she is feeling and help alleviate confusion and calm emotions.'
Sometimes, police may return to the same address numerous times. In cases like that, 911 dispatchers log notes and reports from the calls.
'So if there is a child and they use the bag and the child responds well to a specific sensory item, they can put that in the notes for the next time,' VanRyn said.
The students conducted several events to raise funds to purchase the items for the bags. They included a community drive for donations, donation boxes at local businesses and a flyer they developed to advertise the need. The school district shared the project on social media. They also set up an Amazon list of needed items and shared the link.
'This service project gave me a feeling of accomplishment,' CHS senior Alexis Alvarado said. 'There are not a lot of things that give you the feeling of truly making a difference, but this project did.'
Once all items were collected at the end of November, the students put together 21 Buddy Bags. Ten went to CPD, since they have 10 patrol cars out at a time, and the others went to student resource officers at the local elementary schools, middle schools and CHS.
'I helped create the communication cards and I was so excited to explain them to the police officers,' student Alize Johnson said. 'This project was very meaningful.'
The officers who received the Buddy Bags were grateful for the items to help with their job.
'In the more than 20 years I've been with the Cleburne Police Department, I've seen a lot of useful donations,' SRO Wesley Mackey. 'This was probably the most researched, well thought out and useful donation the department has received.'
