Gary F. Cox, Criminal Justice, Course 1010
by Olimpiu Nedelcu
Should police officers have a college education?
In United States the law enforcement is structured in three levels: national (or federal)
level, state level and local level. The main reason for dividing the Law Enforcement in such a
way is due to the principle of federalism and the division of powers, thus enforcing the law at
federal, state and local level has to be done by those who are vested with authority according
to the US Constitution. It’s important to know that organizing and prioritizing the law
enforcement agencies makes it easier and more efficient for the justice system to fight the
different types of crime out there.
Since the beginning of the first attempts to implement a law enforcement official (the
sheriff) during the 1700’s in the colonial America, continuing through the 1800’s with the
creation of the first “formal night watch” in Boston and then that of the first modern police
department in New York City which was “combining the day and night watches under the
control of a single police chief”, the law enforcement in US kept improving its self culminating in
1900’s with the innovatory pioneering training system “of the potential police officers in
institutions of higher learning”. August Vollmer (born of two German immigrants), the father of
modern police administration is credited for the development of “the first program to grant a
degree in law enforcement, at San Jose State College”, and as a consequence Vollmer’s most
successful protégé -O.W. Wilson was able to give a twist to the whole policing style, promoting
the professional model, stressing “the need for efficiency through bureaucracy and technology”.
The progress in science and technology obviously made way for the advancement of police
methods in organizing its self in order to be more efficient at dealing with and solving the
multitudes of types of crime. The new departments within the police agencies demanded
people with skills in toxicology, forensics and many other fields or matters, increasing the need
for a higher education in order to keep up with the advancement of science, and to maintain a
certain quality of the people who wanted to serve the law and to enforce it.
Should police officers have a college education? In a modern society where most people
go to college to be able to enlighten themselves and learn from what others’ hard work and
experience brought forward, college education is mandatory especially for those who want to
serve the law in a just and proper way. Besides of having the benefits of learning the intricacies
of the criminal justice system and how they work, a college education is a portion of what some
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call “the school of life”. By interacting with other students and teachers, people continuously
shape their character, adding good morals as a base for the specialty knowledge they
accumulate in school. In a world where everyone else is evolving by studying the latest
technologies and advancements in any other field, a police officer should never feel like an
“obsolete computer” because that would definitely make the society feel not any safer than a
bunch of sheep in the woods. Knowledge, common sense, patience, good morals and
experience should be a good and safe combination of skills for any police officer, and going
through college should really make a difference especially given the overwhelming situations
where police officers are breaking the law (sad but true). If it’s either a case of police brutality
or human weakness (because police officers can be enticed or tempted as well), a college
experience should continuously emphasize and reiterate the importance of being fair, honest,
patient and alert, because in the law enforcement work, mistakes are not so easily fixable,
overlooked or forgotten and they may cost innocent lives.
A college education is mandatory also from the perspective of how crime is becoming
more sophisticated technology wise. Drugs, terrorism, and white-collar crimes are using
innovative ways as well because their money can provide them with the right “tools” for
obtaining what they’re after. It’s impossible to imagine how a group of police officers without
any training would handle a bomb-threat situation or a bank-wire fraud, not to mention an
ongoing terrorist attack. Working in a high profile crime area, or in a politically sensitive area
like Washington DC makes the job even more demanding, and that is why the law enforcement
agencies had to organize themselves according to the tasks they needed to excel in.
Today, the wide variety of the law enforcement agencies (federal, state and local) are
cooperating in many ways, in different situations (nationally and internationally) in order to be
more efficient, and by learning a multitude of skills in college, a future police officer can widen
his/her options in finding the right job or in pursuing a more in depth career, given the fact that
educated, skilful people are in high demand at anytime, anywhere.
Bibliography:
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Larry K., Gaines / Roger LeRoy, Miller. Criminal Justice in Action (textbook).
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