105 Police Added to the JCF’s Ranks

The Jamaica Constabulary Force’s crime fighting capacity has been boosted with the graduation of 105 policemen and women from the Twickenham Park training facility in St. Catherine on February 16. The graduates will be placed on frontline duty as constables.
Addressing the gathering, Minister of National Security, Dr. Peter Phillips, informed that the graduation exercise marked, “a fundamental stage in the reform of the security forces.”
He pointed out, that the next batch of graduates to be turned out from the academy, would be “the standard bearers of a new, better trained and more professional Jamaica Constabulary Force,” with the introduction of competency-based education and training.
According to the Minister, the change in training methods would provide “graduates with all they need to know in order to apply skilled, professional behaviour and the appropriate mental pre-disposition to the work of policing.”
He noted also, that all areas of training for members of the JCF have been subjected to rigorous examination and modifications have been made where necessary.
These include changes in the qualification and requirements for entry to the force; implementation of a revamped curriculum; extension of the basic recruit-training period; upgrading of the standards and required output for all officers; and, the streamlining of specialist training requirements for officers.
The modification is expected to bring training of police officers on par with teachers and nurses, make policing more attractive and offer “career opportunities for our brightest sons and daughters,” the Minister informed.