McCallum’s drug dog retires after nine years with AISD

fter serving for the Austin Independent School District for nine years, Rocco, the much feared and much loved golden retriever, retired from his position as the McCallum police dog on March 2. Rocco and his owner, Officer Tony Andrew, first met each other in October 2009 and have not been separated since. Officer Andrew worked with two other dogs prior to Rocco, but did not have nearly as much of a connection with them as he has with Rocco.

Officer Andrew is not alone in that respect. Though Officer Andrew and Rocco were sad to say goodbye, Rocco has been in puppy paradise since. Now that Rocco doesn’t have to work for his treats anymore, Andrews say that he’s been living life like a “normal” dog.

“Back when I had him as a police dog, I wanted to keep his drive high and have him work for his toy,” Officer Andrew said. “But now he’s got that toy, and three or four other toys, just scattered around the backyard available for him to play whenever he wants.”

Rocco served in many different capacities at McCallum. He patrolled the school, searched for drugs on campus, attended presentations with Officer Andrew, and (perhaps most importantly) served as the unofficial pet dog for the entire student body. Officer Andrew claims that finding and removing any narcotics on campus was very rewarding, but Rocco’s presence and attraction from students was truly amazing.

“I’d like to say the times where we found drugs in the schools and we get to take them off campus [were some of our best memories],” Officer Andrew said. “But mainly it was when I got to do presentations or just hang out, and kids got to interact with him.”

Rocco also served as a bridge for students interacting with the police on campus.

“He allowed me as an officer to be more approachable, because people saw that I had a dog,” Officer Andrew said. “So people came up and talked to me, and that was the segue into talking to people and them getting to know their officers.”

Mr. Garrison did not have any specific memories that he and Rocco shared together, but he said that he enjoyed the groups of students who always surrounded Rocco when he visited the campus.

“My favorite memories with Rocco would just be when Rocco was out in the hall, and all the kids would stop by to pet on him,” Mr. Garrison said. “And you could tell the students liked him as a dog and as a pet.”

Even though Rocco was much beloved, he also had a job to do, one he did extremely well. He was brought on campus to keep the campus safe and free of narcotics. As far as the precise amount he kept off campus, that’s undetermined, but Garrison said he did his official job well.

“Hopefully Rocco’s presence and Rocco’s expertise kept some drugs off McCallum High School,” Mr. Garrison said. “And that’s really the purpose of bringing Rocco or any other drug dog onto the campus.”

Rocco recorded more than 1,000 positive drug finds, Officer Mike Reilly said, adding that every time Rocco came to McCallum he found something.

“He’s found everything,” Officer Reilly said. “He’s trained to find all narcotics, so we’ve found just about everything.”

Officer Reilly met Rocco and Officer Andrew back in 2011 but didn’t start working with them until about two and a half years ago. Some of his best memories with Rocco are said to be when Rocco and his dog have puppy play-dates.

“Rocco and my dog are best friends,” Officer Reilly said. “I bring my dog over to Andrew’s house and vice versa, and we just let them play around. They love it.”

Officer Reilly described Rocco as “excited.”

“No matter if he’s just meeting people or finding drugs, he’s just the most happy and excited and chipper dog I’ve ever seen,” Officer Reilly said. “I thought he was 2, and he’s 11, just because he still acts like a puppy. He’s just so motivated to please and [to] make people happy.”

According to several McCallum students, Rocco was a loving dog. The fact that he was on campus to find illegal drugs did not seem to bother them.

“He’s a friendly and sweet dog,” junior Anika Verma said. “Even if there were no drugs for him to search for, occasionally they would bring him in rooms so we could play with him. I would also visit him in the halls and in Officer’s Andrew’s office.”
According to junior Victoria Garcia, Rocco was (literally) a woman’s best friend.

“Rocco was my best friend,” Garcia said. “I would go and not leave class, but I would go hang out with Officer Reilly, and Rocco would be in there and I would play with him. And we would go in the hallways and throw his ball all the way down the hall.”

Although most of the students at McCallum loved Rocco, according to Assistant Principal Andrew Baxa, one year Rocco was determined to be one of McCallum’s top rivals.

“They did a poll saying something like, ‘What was McCallum’s top rivals?’ Of course LBJ, LASA, was up there, but Rocco made the top three,” Mr. Baxa said. “Pretty much every time he came here, somebody left in handcuffs, so that was probably why he got the reputation of being the biggest rival because it seemed like somebody was always getting busted every time Rocco showed up.”

Even though many students were sad to see Rocco go, his hard work paid off over the nine years he worked with AISD. After Rocco retired, there was a post dedicated to him on MacJournalism that elicited several responses from current and former students.

“Rocco is so iconic,” junior and former McCallum student Meena Anderson posted to @MacJournalism. “I’ll miss him.”

“He was there when no one else was,” junior Abbi Richter said in a comment.

Officer Andrew said he really appreciated the student comments to the post.

“I saw one comment on the Instagram page and almost started crying because I didn’t know that many people cared about him,” Officer Andrew said. “Someone was like ‘Great. 2017 sucks already.’ So I went on there and commented and thanked everyone for the kind words.”