NCJ Number
197257
Journal
Police Chief Volume: 69 Issue: 10 Dated: October 2002 Pages: 134,136-138,139
Date Published
October 2002
Length
5 pages
Annotation
This article discusses the importance of formal education in developing police leaders.
Abstract
Formal education plays a critical role in the development of police executives. However, collegiate study at both the undergraduate and graduate level tends to be generic in focus, expensive, and slow to deliver practical skills. As a result, specialized training programs of relatively short duration have evolved at the national and regional levels. Many States have also implemented senior management training programs through their law enforcement certifying bodies. When properly delivered, such national, regional, or State programs have demonstrated their value in preparing police leaders for complex management tasks. National surveys of law enforcement CEOs suggest overwhelming support for both formal education and specialized management training. A potential solution to the problem of affordable and accessible managerial training involves developing instructional programs at the local level in cooperation with nearby educational institutions. Law enforcement agencies striving to develop a partnership with local colleges should seek out criminal justice, business, sociology, political science, or continuing education departments that are more likely to have the faculty, interest, and funding for innovative programs. In order to be effective, police executive development training must demonstrate the direct relevance of classroom theory to everyday management and crime control problems. Program delivery should reflect the needs of the adult learner, which places more emphasis on the learning process and less on the teaching process. It is recommended that programmatic content for university-based police training be addressed through focus group participation by knowledgeable practitioners. The biggest obstacle to building training partnerships involves money. A tactic used by private industry for controlling overhead involves creating training consortiums where companies pool their resources and contract with a university or private firm to provide management training. 15 footnotes