Taking A Look At The Level Of Police Training

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Throughout the years, issues have been brought up whether police officers have the proper education and level of training to perform the job that the public have entrusted them with. As many individuals know, education is an important qualification that employers look for nowadays. The questions arises whether law enforcement agencies should require their officers to possess a two-year, or a four-year college degree along with a police academy certification in order to become employed as a police officer. Additionally, other issues that arises are whether an officer’s education level play a major role in their ability to understand and protect the rights of the public they serve. Critics may often argue that an officer without any type of education …show more content…

It is stressed that education is a necessity for promoting a moral society (Telep, 2008). Not only is obtaining an education important for the individual, but it allows society to continue, because the individuals are taught to instill the culture and values of society (Telep, …show more content…

Some believe that education improves a police officer’s effectiveness, but unfortunately, data supporting this is difficult to obtain. In the research process, several work habits and relationships with education were measured (Bostrom, 2015). If the data indicated that officers with higher education have better work habits, and better habits that results in a perception that they are more professionals, than it would be possible to contribute to a theory of a relationship between increased professionalism of police officer and education above high school (Bostrom, 2015). Some of the demographic and educational used in the data included age, gender, years of experience, years of education beyond high school, and type of college degree (Bostrom, 2015). The work habits assessed consisted of commendations, police vehicle crashes, sick time usage and number of times they were disciplined. These data demonstrated that officers with a high school diploma had work habits similar to those officers who have a master’s degree (Bostrom, 2015). Ultimately, what they found is that degree in discipline such as the Bachelor of Arts and Bachelors of Science made the difference. Officers with the Bachelor of Science degree showed that “they were below the mean (average) in