The NJ Police Chief Magazine Volume 26, Number 1 | Page 5

The New Jersey Police Chief Magazine | September 2019
EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR’S REPORT
MITCHELL C. SKLAR
NJSACOP CONTINUES TO REACH OUT FOR GLOBAL PERSPECTIVE
IN POLICE LEADERSHIP
2019 Senior Leaders Course conducted in cooperation with the
Scottish Police College and Police Scotland
The NJSACOP has a well-earned reputation for offering our members and other
stakeholders cutting-edge professional development opportunities and fresh perspectives
on contemporary issues. One of our Association’s key strategies in delivering such opportunities is looking beyond
the traditional topics, presenters, venues and methods of law enforcement professional development and
education. While of course we have an enormous wealth of talent, knowledge and experience right here in our
own backyard, we naturally do not have a monopoly on these assets. Accordingly, we continually seek out the
best that can be found from across our borders – whether those borders are local, state, national - or even
international.
Professional and personal growth benefits from looking beyond
the routine, the comfortable, the local; in short, from being open
to new experiences, information, and perspectives. The 19 police
professionals that attended the 2019 NJSACOP Senior
Leadership Seminar at Scottish Police College did just that,
and much more. The program, conducted in conjunction with the
Scottish Police College and Police Scotland, was held July 06 – 14,
2019 at the College’s campus at Tulliallan Castle in Fife, Scotland.
In putting together the agenda for the program, we were able to
take advantage of the close links we’ve forged over the past few
years with the College, as well as other police executives and
academics in the United Kingdom. The result was an agenda that
included a rich mix of practitioners and police educators, as well
as the opportunity to make several site visits of great interest to
our group of law enforcement professionals.
The limited registration for this seminar served to maximize the interactive nature
of the learning experience. The agenda was broken down into multiple units, with
a special emphasis on Decision Making, Command and Control of Critical Incidents,
Operational Safety and De-escalation, Policing of Public Disorder, Use of Force,
Community Policing and Partnerships, and Local Policing Strategies Addressing
Drug-Related Deaths. These topics were not chosen at random; on the one hand,
New Jersey’s law enforcement leaders have been confronted with these challenges
in ways not readily imaginable just a few short years ago, while Scotland’s public
safety professionals have been dealing with these issues for many years. They have
drawn many lessons from these experiences, and are more than eager to share
these lessons. The specific information provided on plans, tactics, strategies, mistakes, successes, and the like
were interesting and useful, even more importantly was the chance for our attendees to look at these topics from
another perspective and to challenge their own thoughts and assumptions.
The agenda included additional units focusing on Forensics, Civilian Oversight,
Firearms Training, and other topics. Additionally, the seminar-like nature of the
program allowed for lively interchanges between the participants and the
presenters – both during and after the classroom sessions. The seminar
started off with a welcome from Iain Livingstone, Chief Constable of Police
Scotland.
There was also a morning reserved for a leadership “staff ride” led by our very
own Professor Pat Schuber of Fairleigh Dickinson University, where the focus
was on the events, personalities and lessons to be derived from the historically
significant Battle of Bannockburn and the nearby Wallace 4 Monument.
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