Relaxing weekends are a luxury no longer afforded to the six student cadets in the Athens County Sheriff’s Police Academy.
The six Ohio University students have traded sleeping in on Saturdays for early morning lectures and training to pursue dreams of becoming a law-enforcement officer.
Five months of rigorous training — which consists of 27 to 34 hours per week — will culminate in the students receiving an Ohio Peace Officer Training Academy certificate. The certificate is required for anyone who holds a position where they carry a firearm in Ohio.
Although most law-enforcement hopefuls must wait until after they graduate college to receive the certificate, the sheriff’s academy allows OU students to complete the requirements while they are in school.
A perk that Cadet Jen Atkins, a junior studying criminology and sociology, couldn’t pass up.
“To be hired at a lot of employers around the state, you need this certification, and if you don’t have it, then they have to foot the bill for you to take the academy,” she said. “This allows me to walk in and say, ‘I’ve already got this.’ ”
Training at the academy costs participants almost $4,000, and at the end of the five months, cadets take a series of four physical tests and a written exam, Sheriff’s Capt. Bryan Cooper said.
If they pass, students will hold a commission and have the ability to work in an internship-like capacity for the Athens County Sheriff’s Office as a reserve deputy.
Reserves don’t get paid, but the department tries to hire deputies from its reserve ranks, Cooper said.
“If they decide later that they want to go to another agency, then we’ll just transfer their commission,” he said. “But we’ll first hold that commission, which is dear to their heart, because if somebody’s not holding their commission, then, in time, they’ll lose it.”
Although the academy requires long hours, officials work around students’ schedules, said Kelly Faust, a visiting OU criminology professor.
“The thing that’s special about this academy is that it gives students the opportunity to complete both their training and still be full-time students,” Faust said.
Cadet Ben Taylor, a junior studying sociology and criminology, is taking Faust’s Intro to Criminology class and said the academy training is worthwhile.
“It’s a lot of effort, but we’re all walking out of here with training that puts us far ahead of anybody else,” he said. “We can jump right into the game, and though we’re making sacrifices now, the reward will ultimately be worth the investment.”
Officials with the sheriff’s office train the OU students at Athens High School — a collaboration that’s important for the academy, said Charlie Mansfield, sheriff’s academy defensive tactics instructor.
“(This) helps the high school because they have a law-enforcement presence without having to pay for it, and it gives the high-school students a chance to see us and think, ‘I want to be a part of that,’ ” Mansfield said.
Though Mansfield never worked for the Athens County Sheriff’s Office, the Vietnam veteran and local pastor has taught in training academies for more than 40 years. He tries to focus on not only tough instruction but also life lessons with his students.
“My goal is to inspire them to never quit. We train them to survive in the field, but we also train them to survive in their marriages,” he said. “We teach them how to succeed in their home life.”
jj360410@ohiou.edu
