Kickstarting a Career in Police Work

JERHAMY POW '17
New Rochelle, NY

MAJOR:
Criminal Justice

INTERNSHIP:
Nantucket Police Department

My duties as a Community Service Officer (CSO) for the Nantucket Police Department (NPD) consisted of working foot patrol in downtown Nantucket, assisting with parking and traffic enforcement, crowd control, security, and more.

I also worked at the substation two days a week assisting the town by answering questions, retrieving lost items and bringing them to the main station, etc.

While working with the NPD, I learned many different hands-on techniques on how to deal with face-to face confrontations, security techniques, radio traffic skills, traffic and parking laws, Nantucket bylaws, and the overall experience of working within a police department. The industry skills that I have learned include dealing with radio communication with a lot going on at once and remembering that not everyone can speak at the same time, as well as understanding that management follows the NPD chain of command. I have gained so much experience it is hard to put it all in words.

"I have gained so much experience it’s hard to put it all in words."

What did you learn?
This internship will help me after I graduate because now I have experience in my field and this is definitely what I want to do. This internship has inspired me to strive harder to secure a position with a police department. I don’t believe my home state has this type of a program for internship so I will now be able to bring this experience home and speak about it in a wonderful way.

"Treat your internship as if it was your career job."

Advice for others
Treat your internship as if it was your career job so that you can either show your passion for it or figure out if you need to readjust and find a new career path to take. You don’t want to wait until you graduate to find out that you are not going to love what you will be doing.

If you have an opportunity to take an internship do it! Anyone can study or remember a term for an exam, but actually doing the job could change everything. I was so caught up in my internship I forgot I was an intern. I felt like a real part of the department, which is how everyone’s overall experience should be.