By Sarah Hall
Editor
On a recent cloudy Wednesday, a group of high school kids admired an arsenal of weaponry, got an earful from a sheriff’s detective and went for a ride in an armored police car.
They’re not criminals — but they hope to work with them some day.
The students are part of Onondaga-Cortland-Madison BOCES’ New Vision Criminal Justice program, which celebrates its 25th anniversary this year. On this particular day, the students were touring the Onondaga County Sheriff’s heliport, where the department also houses its SWAT vehicles.
New Vision programs at BOCES immerse students in actual work environments — in the case of the criminal justice program, that means courts, town police departments, the Onondaga County Sheriff’s Office and others—to provide them with hands-on learning experience. The program, which seeks to train students for a career in criminal justice, is taught by Charlie Wilson, a former DeWitt police officer known for his efforts at increasing community policing.
“I’ve done all different kinds of community policing. It was always my area of expertise,” Wilson said. “I ran a youth program at Springfield Gardens with DeWitt. You get to know kids and you keep them out of trouble.”
Offered to high school seniors throughout OCM BOCES’ coverage area and taught at the Onondaga County Sheriff’s Office, the program prepares students for a variety of careers in law enforcement, from Homeland Security to forensic science. Students study the court and corrections systems, crime prevention, law enforcement in the media and more. They get the opportunity to work with law enforcement professionals through class visitations and job shadowing opportunities. The class includes a trip to Washington, D.C., where participants visit the FBI Academy Police Memorial, the Smithsonian Institute, Congress, Capitol Hill and the Bureau of Engraving. The course also fulfills a number of state graduation requirements, including English 12, Participation in Government (PIG) and economics.
Wilson said the hands-on training the program offers provides students with a much better education than a classroom ever could.
“Everything else, like the criminal justice program [at Onondaga Community College, where Wilson also teaches], it’s just an academic program,” he said. “It doesn’t really train you for it. With this, we spend a year telling you not to be cops. Then if they do, they know what they’re getting into.”
Danielle Soule knew what she was getting into, thanks to the New Vision program. A Cicero-North Syracuse grad who completed the program in 2007, she said she was attracted to its interactive nature.
“I always thought I wanted to help people,” Soule said. “I was kind of just going through the program, like the courses you could take, and I saw the New Visions program and I went and I sat in for a day and it was all hands-on. It was, ‘Let’s talk about stories and what is going on in the media and news,’ and this and that.”
Soule now works at the Onondaga County Justice Center, and she said the connections she made through the New Visions program helped her to obtain that position.
“When you want to get into law enforcement, what I tell people all the time is network. Talk to as many people as you can. This is an excellent source for networking,” she said. “I’m like nobody in jail right now, I’m low man on the fish food chain, but you just meet people and you can talk to them.”
Soule noted that Wilson doesn’t sugarcoat the job.
“He doesn’t hold back,” she said. “He shows the good and the bad, too. They’ll have the eye opening experience when they go to D.C. and walk around the policemen’s memorial. That is the best part of the class. It gives you the eye-opening experiences.”
Soule noted that a career in law enforcement isn’t for everyone.
“I don’t remember how many were in my class, but I think there are only four of us left who are still in law enforcement,” she said. “I’d say probably out of all of them standing there, maybe five of them will actually [make it]. School will wash some out. The background investigation will wash some out, and some people just realize, ‘This isn’t for me.’ It is just not for everybody.”
But for those who make the cut, Soule said, as tough as it is, it can be a very rewarding career, especially when she gets to see youth like those in the New Vision program who are still excited about their future.
“It’s a good job,” she said. “I’ve always wanted … not to sound cheesy, but to inspire people, so it is nice to see this. When you work in law enforcement you see the [guys who have] 25 years on the job [who are] miserable, burnt out, then you see kids like this who are like, ‘Oh, I can’t wait.’ It is refreshing. Hopefully I’ll work with some of them some day.”
