SAVE promotes

safety and peace in schools. According to Flat Rock counselor Susan McEwan,

the new program, which will be school-wide, will begin in home room and

parallel with the character education curriculum currently being taught.

Eventually a club will be formed that will meet after school.

During SAVE

meetings, students will have an opportunity to bring attention to problems

they feel are plaguing the school and then develop ways in which to solve

those problems.

"This

program has been very successful in other states and I am hopeful that

it is going to be just as helpful to Flat Rock," says McEwan.

Some examples

of SAVE's success include helping to reduce the amount of theft in one

school and cutting the number of fights in another.

"One school

was having a problem with stealing. What students found was that most

of them were leaving their lockers open so they developed stickers to

put on the door of open lockers and the theft decreased," McEwan

explains.

"Another

school decided to target fighting by getting the administration to agree

to serve ice-cream to all students every three weeks if no fighting occurred.

After the first three weeks a fight broke out and the parties involved

got booed by their peers so they stopped," she says.

Flat Rock will

kick off its SAVE rally March 9 at 8:30 a.m. in place of home room.

In addition

to SAVE, Flat Rock also has a successful student mentoring program with

Burch Elementary where 58 students go to the elementary school twice a

week to help kindergarten through fifth grade students with reading.

Additionally,

Peer helpers, called Eagle Wings, help target students who are in distress

and peer mediators help to solve conflicts between students.