Grapevine-Colleyville ISD is continuing a relationship with a Grapevine police officer in a class offered at Grapevine High School.

At Monday night's GCISD board of trustees meeting, the board explained that the district has offered a criminal justice class at the high school for several years. Last year the district employed a city police officer part-time to teach the class, and this person is now certified to teach and can be a full-time employee.

GCISD Chief Operations Officer Paula Barbaroux said the district is looking to simply continue this relationship and that this agreement has been the plan the whole time.

Board member Jesse Rodriguez brought up a question of the program’s sustainability if the officer in question is unable to continue teaching the program.

Barbaroux said the program will continue with or without this same officer employed and that right now the dual benefit of employing this officer is that it fulfills the need to have an additional armed officer in the building. Under the agreement, the officer will be armed and is able to respond to emergency situations that occur at GHS when the officer is present, just as school resource officers are so authorized.

The motion to enter an interlocal agreement with the city of Grapevine to employ the officer was approved unanimously.