Placing police officers in Toronto high schools has reduced crime and improved student perceptions of police, according to a report commissioned by the Toronto Police Service and the Toronto and Catholic district school boards.

Only 70 offences were reported in the 2008-09 school year, compared with 89 the previous year — a drop of 21.4 per cent.

Among the most common offences were assault, threatening, robbery and mischief, the report said.

The report's authors tried to evaluate the success of the school resource officer program, in which police officers are assigned full time to 50 high schools around the city. Almost 11,500 surveys were distributed to students, parents and staff at schools in October 2008 and again in May 2009.

Chief Bill Blair of the Toronto police told a news conference Wednesday that he was particularly happy with the finding that 67 per cent of students surveyed reported a "good or excellent" relationship with the police in their schools.

That's up from 56 per cent in September 2008, when the program started.

Toronto police introduced the program in response to a public outcry over the shooting death of 15-year-old Jordan Manners in a school hallway in May 2007. They have touted the program as a way to strengthen ties between students and the community.

'It's about engaging'

Const. Martin Douglas, who has been a fixture at Sir Robert Borden Business and Technical Institute in Scarborough for more than a year, said it wasn't easy fitting in at first.

"It was like being new to the playground," he said. "No one is talking to you, everyone is suspicious."

But Douglas has now become much more involved and has set up an after-school club that offers tutoring, snacks and lessons in the street dance krumping.

"It's about grade point average," Douglas said. "It's about engaging with at-risk youth. I usually take the time to talk to them about conflict resolution, talk about their school community and how they can better it."

Blair admitted some students and parents are still uncomfortable with the idea of police officers in schools.

Tensions over the program reached a peak this fall after a cellphone camera captured the arrest of a teen at Northern Secondary School. Many students were angry over the way the teen was treated, but police called the arrest an isolated incident and said the officer handled himself well, considering the circumstances.

"We'll continue to work at earning the trust of our partners and earning the respect and the trust of the young people of this city," Blair said.