John Martin is the first recipient of the college’s Public Safety Officer of the Year Award. The Guilfordian caught up with Martin to find out what it’s like to be the finest of Guilford’s finest.
Guilfordian: How long have you worked at Guilford?
Martin: I started working with Allied (as a contractor) last year. I hired on with Guilford staff in the middle of last year, so two years.
Guilfordian: Where else have you worked?
Martin: I worked for thirty two years in the airline industry. I was an operations supervisor, and the last four years I was a ticket supervisor.
Guilfordian: How does it compare to working at Guilford?
Martin: In both jobs, you have to maintain a good relationship with the customer.
Guilfordian: When did you find out you won the Officer of the Year Award?
Martin: The night of the Public Safety Appreciation Dinner, back in December. All the officers names were read and we came on stage to get our appreciation awards. After they gave me the appreciation award they told me that I also won the Officer of the Year.
Guilfordian: How did that feel?
Martin: How did that feel? Well, I was surprised. But, anyone down here, anyone who works in Public Safety, deserves to win the award.
Guilfordian: What was it that set you apart from the other Public Safety officers?
Martin: Well, let’s see. I’m always at work on-time. I work different shifts: if they need me in the evening, I come in. That’s a harder shift, because you have to lock up the buildings, and things are more dangerous at night.
Guilfordian: What do you like most about this job?
Martin: The students here keep me in a younger frame of mind. The job keeps me outside, keeps me interacting with people. I like the work, I enjoy coming in.
Guilfordian: What’s the hardest part about being a Public Safety officer?
Martin: The hardest part? There’s nothing particularly difficult about the job. Basically, it’s interacting with students and faculty and staff and establishing a good rapport with them and trying to maintain a friendly attitude towards everyone. I guess one of the hardest parts is writing up students. You have to handle the situation; it’s not my favorite part of the job. The biggest challenge is when a student has medical emergency or gets hurt. I don’t like to see anyone get hurt.
Guilfordian: Have you ever had problems when you are writing up students?
Martin: Usually you can defuse the situation. There are times, there have been cases with students, but you can generally defuse the situation.
Guilfordian: What’s the most memorable thing that’s happened to you as a Public Safety Officer?
Martin: Well, (laughs) last spring I caught eight students skinny-dipping down in the lake.
Guilfordian: That must have been pretty embarrassing.
Martin: No, they saw my cart coming down the path and by the time I got to where they were they had run into the woods with their clothes. I could hear them laughing; I don’t know what they were doing.
Guilfordian: Did you catch them?
Martin: Five of them. Later that night I was back by the lake, on-patrol. I was going into the woods as they were coming up. Of course their hair was wet and everything. So I asked them “Y’all been swimming?” and of course they say “Oh, no sir, no sir.” But, funny incidents happen pretty much every day. It’s hard to pick a favorite story.
Guilfordian: Do you have any suggestions to improve Public Safety?
Martin: I think Public Safety has improved since we switched (contractors) from Allied to in-house. With Allied, we had to do it a certain way, and that was it. Now, if, say, a student is doing a minor violation and I drive up, I can say “You’re not allowed to be doing this.” If I leave and come back in fifteen minutes and he’s still doing it, I’ll write him up. But I’m not going to write him up for a minor violation, without a warning.
Guilfordian: Do you have any thing you’d like to add, about the award or public safety in general?
Martin: Well, I appreciate the fact that they thought of me that way. Like I said before, I enjoy coming here. It’s a good job, I enjoy it.