With the retirement of the acclimated School Resource Officer Rob Woyicki, the school welcomes new Resource Officer Brian Loveless.  And as the school year comes to an exciting start, Loveless shares his passion and excitement for making connections with students and faculty, as well as keeping the school and its inhabitants safe. 

“Within the time that I have left remaining in my career, I thought it would be a good choice to finish out my career as a school resource officer as my way of giving back to the community and the younger crowd to grow and prosper,” Loveless said. 

Born in Upstate New York, Loveless received a culture shock when first moving down to North Carolina. With each state being unique in different ways, Loveless had to make some adjustments. 

“I liked the culture, the land, no bugs, the temperature, stuff like that, ” Loveless said of his home state. “It is very different there in retrospect to more of the heat and cool versus being in shorts and t-shirts down here in North Carolina during the early winter months.” 

Ever since a young age, Loveless realized that he wanted to tackle a career in law enforcement, but that wasn’t without a little inspiration. 

“I had a family member that was a police officer in Syracuse, New York, and I was totally bought into her style. So, it was the start of my passion to be a police officer,” Loveless said. And ever since then, his career has flourished, with 18 years of experience serving the community.  

Loveless worked in North Carolina for 15 years and in Virgina for three years in various positions, including hotel / motel interdiction, highway interdiction, as well as narcotics. 

With the career shift, Loveless continues to adjust to the new changes and challenges that being a school resource officer brings. 

“What’s interesting, in my mind as a police officer, is going from being a patrol-minded officer to going to be a school resource officer. It is the mindset of young folks that is intriguing to me,” Loveless said. “It is a lot different because I dealt with adults most of the time, and now I’m dealing with juveniles or young adults that aren’t of the same mindset. So, transitioning from older people to younger people, it’s just a different transition.”

Loveless displays a special passion for his work and for helping others around him that’s not hard to see.  And with working for so long in the same career, he has advice for others who would want to undertake law enforcement as well. 

His advice would be to not only, “have a strong passion for helping people and know what you’re getting into,” but also to “kiss your weekend goodbye, because you’re probably going to be working them for a while.” However, even though being a police officer is difficult in certain ways, to Loveless it is all worth it. 

“It is rewarding and it has been such a reward for me in the last 18 years. There have been a lot of hills and valleys with it, but it is very rewarding,” Loveless said.