Broken Arrow Police Team With NSU Initiative To Help New Officers Jumpstart Their Education

The Broken Arrow Police Department and Northeastern State University are partnering to increase recruiting efforts for the police department.

While BAPD is currently fully staffed, the partnership between BAPD and NSU will allow BAPD to remain competitive when it comes to getting recruits in the door.

"We recognize that applicants for law enforcement are dwindling across the nation. It’s a nationwide problem, and so this is just one more way that the City of Broken Arrow can be competitive and offer continuing education to our officers, and also provide our community with the best officers that we can," Deidre Hughes, BAPD's captain over training division, said.

Will Cadets Get College Credit?

Anyone who gets hired by BAPD and completes the 6-month BAPD training academy will also be able to get 27 college credit hours at NSU to go towards a bachelor's degree in criminal justice.

Eloy Chavez, NSU's Dean of the College of Extended Learning and Continuing Education, said this will allow recruits to start or continue their education beyond the police academy.

"Those officers not only can get and stay into law enforcement, but they can reach out with the criminal justice degree if they want to get into becoming a lawyer, becoming an emergency management director or beyond, or stay for the betterment of BAPD," Chavez said.

This partnership is already in place, meaning that the current group of recruits going through the training academy will be able to receive college credit hours from NSU. Applications for the next training academy at the Broken Arrow Police Department are set to open towards the end of the year.