Police Chiefs and Training Officers: How Important is Training in Your Department?

In today's modern police departments, the public that is being served deserves, and in fact demands, the best trained, most competent police officers that can be obtained.

This is not just limited to the patrolman, but extends to your career officers in your investigative divisions as well.

Far too many departments, understandably feeling the crunch of reduced training dollars, feel the need to look for alternatives and in different directions to obtain certain necessary training. This makes for some very tough decisions.

Can you go out and find "training on the cheap?" Sure. For every requirement, there is either a vendor selling reduced cost training or a replacement for tried and true technology. The saying that comes to mind from an old car repair advertisement is: "You can pay me now....or you can pay me later."

With all the decisions you have to make, the American Polygraph Association (APA) want you to know that the selection you make as to where you send your officers for training is critically important. In addition, the equipment you purchase is equally important. You certainly would not purchase weapons for your officers that had not undergone rigorous testing, nor would you place a patrolman on the street who was unqualified with his sidearm. Why would anyone consider doing this same thing in any other aspect of law enforcement work?

Your professional commitment to the citizens you serve demands that any training must be obtained from an accredited facility and, just as important, one that utilizes and endorses the use of equipment that can withstand scientific scrutiny. The end result is that the student you send to a quality school will pay dividends to you and your department. If you choose to "bargain" for training and make use of a lesser training entity, the probability of future liability is significantly increased.

More and more today, the public is demanding that all forensic capabilities be made available to identify criminals, locate stolen property and reduce crime. A properly trained polygraph examiner can do all that for you.

The APA maintains and administers a demanding program of accrediting certain schools who provide basic and continuing education in the field of polygraph. This program is strict and establishes demanding standards for students. These schools joined some years ago in agreeing to the application of certain standards and their commitment to excellence in training remains uncompromised. Regular inspections ensure that these established standards are never compromised.

If it has not already happened, you will no doubt be exposed to offers of training from entities who have no organizational accreditation, and are ready to make bargain deals with you for the training they can provide. Further, you will no doubt be inundated with offers and testimonials from manufacturers of equipment who claim to produce phenomenal results. The real question comes when you ask what do you want...solid quality training....or save money and obtain questionable results? We in the APA want you to carefully look at these training "bargains" that solicit you for your training dollars. When all is said and done, we in the APA think you, the training professional, will make the right decision and seek training that has a solid reputation of success and equipment which can prove itself scientifically. In fact, the IACP recently endorsed a model for the conduct of polygraph examinations and use of equipment that every training officer and police chief should carefully view when selecting training and/or equipment to fulfill departmental requirements for this demanding forensic science.

Източник: http://www.polygraph.org/