One agency hired 20 people for their academy, then lost half the class in the first month of training. When I asked one of their training staff what the reason was that so many left, their response was, “They decided it was not for them.” I always find this comment interesting and am curious as to what exactly is covered in the first month of training that would cause so many people to decide that policing was not the career for them. I suspected I knew the answer but was still curious.
In a discussion with another member of that agency they happened to mention that the first month of the academy it is a full on ‘stress model’ with lots of screaming, yelling and “smoking the recruits with PT” as punishment for perceived missteps. When I inquired about the rationale behind that time of training he provided the standard explanation, “They have to be able to perform under stress in the field.” When I asked if they were providing any mental skills training or stress management training to the recruits prior to the academy, in the first few days, or even in the first month, the answer was “No”.
We then discussed my concerns with putting the test before the training, the potential negative impacts on learning in an environment of fear, punishment and high stress, the reality that screaming, yelling and punishing recruits is not training, it is just screaming, yelling and punishing recruits, the importance of context in training in order for those skills to transfer and that even if you could somehow justify those behaviors as training the context is that they need to take abuse from people in a position of power and authority in that agency. At this point he stated, “Well, I guess it is just what we do here. It is the culture of the academy and something we have always done.” While I appreciate the honesty of that answer my next question was, “Have you considered the costs to your organization because of that mindset and culture?”
They hired 20 people because they had at least 20 vacancies on the street that they needed to fill. Provided that they did not lose any more recruits throughout the remainder of the academy they would still be short 10 bodies in the field. They had invested a significant amount of time, money and resources in the recruiting and selection process to identify those original 20 recruits as potentially good police officers in their agency. Half of that time, money and resources just walked out the door in the first month of the academy. Would they all have been successful? There is no way of knowing that, but the agency believed they had the potential when they extended the offer of employment to them.
Likely what the 10 recruits who quit meant when they said, “This is not for me.”, is that they did not want to work in an organization, or a profession where they were going to be treated like that and be subjected to continual abuse from people in a position of authority. The agency in question is a very good organization, and that is not the culture of the agency. The recruits who quit, however, had no way of knowing that, so they assumed the academy was a reflect of the agency, cut their losses, and moved on. If they know anyone else who is considering policing as a career, chances are pretty good that they will dissuade them from applying to this agency. The preservice academy should be about training, not trainers try to “weed out” those that somehow “shouldn’t be here” or abusing people under the guise of “stress inoculation training”.
This story is all too common and has been for years. One recent news story highlighted an academy that graduated just 7 out of 25 recruits that started their most recent academy. Of the two previous classes, one graduated 19 of 33 people who started and the other graduated 10 out of 23 who started. These numbers would indicate major issues in their hiring process or their academy, or both.
Another recent post on LinkedIn showed a class of 17 recruits outside in white shirts, ties and dress pants being “smoked with PT” by 12 instructors who were all focused on screaming and yelling at the recruits. How do we justify this as quality training for potential police professionals in 2025?
A recent Associated Press Report titled – 29 Police Recruits Died in Training in Last Decade, contained the following information: “More than two-thirds of the deaths occurred since 2020. Most died of exertion, dehydration, heat stroke and other conditions tied to intense exercise — often on the first day of training. Others died several weeks in, sometimes after suffering trauma during boxing or use-of-force drills or collapsing during high-stakes timed runs on hot days.” A sad commentary on police training in the 21st Century and I suspect none of these deaths showed up in the Line of Duty Death statistics.
The academy I mentioned at the start of this post has made several improvements in their academy, but for some reason has chosen to hang on to the bootcamp of stress model for the first month and are paying a huge price for that. There are still a significant number of academies where the entire academy is built on that stress model as highlighted in some of the previous examples. Not only are they potentially paying a cost by losing good people in the academy, but they have several people who graduate their academies who have learned that once you are in a position of authority that you get to scream and yell at people and generally abuse them. As a result, they generate a significant number of citizens’ complaints and negatively impact the image of the agency and the policing profession.
If your academy model is largely “shut your mouth and do what you are told” then you are likely failing to train important skills in interpersonal communication, critical thinking, problem solving, decision making, and emotional intelligence. This type of academy seems to be content with graduating robotic cops instead of critical thinking police professionals.
One large academy who bills themselves as the “gold standard of police academy training” posted some pictures of a recruit class in their last week at the academy. Every male recruit still had their head shaved, they were still running from class to class, and a photo of the recruits in a classroom with either a member of the instructional cadre of command staff at the front of the room showed the recruits sitting in perfect posture, hands perfectly placed in front of them and their head upright and eyes facing forward. None were taking notes and none were making eye contact with the person at the front of the room. While I realize that photos do not tell the whole story, it appeared they were about to graduate a class of robotic cops.
As a profession we need to do better. We owe it to the profession, we owe it to our agencies, we owe it to the community, we owe it to the men and women in our agencies and we owe it to the people we are training.
I am going to end this post with two quotes.
“It is a healthy thing now and then to hang a question mark on the things you have long taken for granted.”
Bertrand Russell
“Do the best you can until you know better. Then, when you know better, do better.”
Maya Angelou
Take care.
Brian Willis
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