Hi everybody,
I’m 17 and a junior. I’m very interested in going to college and pursuing law enforcement after high school. I’m taking forensic science, criminal justice next year, and currently doing Youth Academy at my local police department.
Should I go to college? Should I just do 2 years at CC and become a cop while also pursuing a further education? I’ve gotten mixed responses from the lieutenant at the academy as well as SROs and would love to know your opinion on this.
Comments
Older is almost always better. Life experience will help you more than anything in this job. You’ll be helping people with marital problems, child issues, meltdowns over losing their home, relapsing into addiction, death of a child/spouse, and countless other “life” problems you don’t truly learn how to deal with until you see or experience them firsthand. A class or textbook won’t help.
I started at 27 and am glad I did. I wouldn’t have been ready at 21. Now, I’ve trained a lot of new officers over the years and those over 25 always seemed to have an easier time.
Stay out of trouble, but live your life for a few years because you’re not going to have much of one as a rookie cop.
I think the sweet spot is around 26/27. Go get a degree in something unrelated or a trade. Something to fall back on if you absolutely hate it or wanna pick up work on days off.
Once you start the job you won’t be able to take off to Europe for a month or anything. So go live your life a while.
I thought I was mature enough to start in LE at 18, didn’t get picked up for corrections. Thought I was mature enough again at 20, didn’t get picked up for LE.
Ended up becoming a cop when I was 24. Looking back I still had tons of maturing left.
Older is definitely better.
When you’re mature
i’d say 25 ish… get some life experience first
I started in a local city jail at 25, worked there for two years then applied for a medium sized Police department. Whenever you decide to join the profession, I recommend starting in the jail. I feel like my experience as a jailer helped me with my patience and maturity as a patrol officer. Good luck OP
25
In states with 20 year retirements, you can start at 21 and retire at 41. If you enter the military at 18 and serve 4 years and your department offers a service buyback, you can enter police service at 22 and retire at 38. You’re only young once and having that type of opportunity is pretty amazing. Would you be a better cop if you matured a little, probably, but you get one shot at life and having a stable income and benefits at such a young age is pretty nice.