Yesterday we had the chance to sit down with Antwine, a School Resource Officer here at Norman North. We got to ask him some questions about what he did prior to law enforcement, how he became a police officer, as well as many others.

Adia Casey: How long have you been at Norman North?

Antwine: I’ve been at Norman North since 2018.

Thomas Richardson: How long have you been a police officer?

Antwine: I’ve been a police officer since 2015.

Adia Casey: What inspired you to get into law enforcement?

Antwine: A frat brother of mine, who was the chief of police then came to me and asked me if I had ever thought about it. The answer was no because I had a master’s in social work so I was doing home and school-based counseling, comfortable in my field. And I had also always thought police officers [were]  political science or criminal justice majors. I didn’t know that any discipline could be a police officer, so I had never thought about becoming one. But, my friend told me to come along and do a ride-along with him to see if it was something that I would be interested in. So I did a ride-along with one of my favorite officers to this day, officer, Chris Allison, and I fell in love with it. I fell in love with the danger, the newness of every day, and how every day was different. But yeah, looking back I feel like it was the best decision of my life.

Adia Casey: What brought you to Norman North specifically?

Antwine: Our school resource [program] started in 2015 when I had just started, so I had to wait a bit, but I knew that it was something that I wanted to do, to get back into schools and to be a mentor and encourage and empower young people as that’s my passion. One because I had that growing up in a single-parent home, raised by my mom and grandparents, and living in poverty all my life. I’m from North Tulsa, so it was one of those things where I have something within me that enjoys empowering other people and letting them know that your circumstances and situations don’t define you and you can be whatever you want to be. Like I never thought that I would be a cop,  you can ask my mom, she’s still shocked, I’m still shocked when I wake up and put on my uniform. After McAllister retired here, I was able to come here and I fell in love with it. I didn’t know if I wanted to do high school or middle school, but they put me in high school and I fell in love with it. I just mesh well with young adults, you know this age group I can talk to you guys as adults, but with middle school and elementary school, I have to talk to them at their levels. And not that I struggle with that by any means, because when I was doing counseling I had four-year-olds all the way up to adults. But as an SRO, I feel like I can make the biggest impact and can relate more to this age group, so that’s why I’m at the high school.

Adia Casey: How have you been able to relate and build relationships with students?

Antwine: Communication, just talking with them and getting to know them at lunch, in the hallways, and going to school events. Just being relatable and staying up on the latest trends and hips and songs and being involved with SPUD. And just doing stuff like this interview, like these things are how you get to know me and how I get to know you guys. And also through negative interactions too when you’re in trouble, you know those are my opportunities too when you’re in the principal’s office for me to interact with you and find underlying issues that are going on. That’s what’s unique about me as far as being a counselor, I look at the whole totality of the situation, not just your behavior. I’m like what’s going on at home? Why are you acting this way? I’m able to think that way because of my background and stuff like that, and so that helps out and I’m able to help out and provide resources, and through those avenues, you are able to relate to kids and make a better impact in people’s lives because of that.

Adia Casey: Do you have a favorite memory so far?

Antwine: There’s a lot of them, I enjoy the talent shows I do for SPUD and the lip-sync battles for SPUD, I enjoy all of those and I get good laughs out of them.  When SPUD was doing decorations last year it was a great night, at the end of the night they had a little party to end the night. And they go on the stage and they play music and dance. I remember that I jumped in the middle and had a dance-off with a couple of students, and that was one of the most memorable things that I can remember just off the top of my head.

Thomas Richardson: Do you have any advice for people who aspire to be police officers or anything within law enforcement?

Antwine: If this is something that you aspire to be or want to do then I definitely recommend it. It’s a noble profession. Sometimes we get a bad rep because we get grouped in when bad things happen in other departments or with other agencies and other cops but overall it’s a very noble profession and awesome job, an awesome career to have, just the things you do. Just the things you do that people your age don’t even think about, the things that we see, the things that we get to do, and the people we get to help out. It’s the dangers of the foot or car chase, but then you have the people you help, you help solve crimes, you help save lives. You know people overdose, people that are having a heart attack and you’re able to help them, it’s buying the lady groceries that can’t afford them because they’re trying to make ends meet, just those things that people don’t see that we do. It’s a very rewarding job, it’s a job where sometimes you got to leave everything at the door because it can carry onto your family. We work a lot. I work a lot and sometimes I’m not there for my own family and I’m there for other people’s families. But I love it and I wouldn’t change it for anything in the world, I’m glad I did it, I’m glad I took the leap of faith and changed career fields in the middle as I became a cop later in life when I was thirty as I had been in a different career path that I enjoyed, but I was looking for something more and this was it.