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| Home Front: Politix |
| Police May Scrap Entrance Exam: Report |
| 2010-01-07 |
| The Chicago Police Department is seriously considering scrapping the police entrance exam, sources tell Fran Spielman. Oooh! Oooh! I seen dis movie! It's called "Police Academy"! Dropping the exam would bolster minority hiring and avert legal battles, according to one source, while others confirm that the exam could be scrapped to open the process to as many people as possible. However, the lack of an exam would make Chicago the lone major city without one, and experts contend that the exam is integral to eliminating unqualified applicants. The CPD has tried in recent years to boost minority hiring by offering the police exam online and turning to minority clergy to help in the recruitment effort. But those efforts have met with frustration. Despite seeing an increase in the number of minority applicants in 2006, the last year the exam was offered, the online component was never launched. And as of last year, one in four patrol officers were African-American, but just one in 12 Lieutenants were of color. Fraternal Order of Police President Mark Donahue said the plan "sounds ridiculous." "With this, you're taking away one of the steps that attempts to legitimize the (hiring) process," he said. Officials at City Hall have admitted that they have been exploring exam options since last fall, according to the Sun-Times. The CPD is currently operating at 2,000 officers-a-day short of its authorized strength. Police hired only 46 officers this year, with plans to hire less than 100 next year -- and those hirings rely on federal funds. What's more, City Hall has floated the idea of imposing cop furloughs to meet a tight budget. |
| Posted by:Fred |
| #14 i think they are saying that they cant find 100 smart black people who are willing to work in union job with promotions handed out by patronage and with absolutely no appreciation of ability. |
| Posted by: abu do you love 2010-01-07 22:20 |
| #13 Are they seriously claiming that they can't find 100 smart black people in all of Chicago for next year's academy? |
| Posted by: bigjim-CA 2010-01-07 21:40 |
| #12 tests discriminate against the stoopid. Don't discriminate! |
| Posted by: Frank G 2010-01-07 19:55 |
| #11 Instead of taking a police exam, you'll merely need to pay off your local Democrat Ward boss to get a police job in Chicago. Of course once you have the job, the ward boss will want a percentage. |
| Posted by: DMFD 2010-01-07 19:45 |
| #10 This was tried already in Miami during the 90's. The result was cops working for the drug gangs, cops forming their own gangs, all the way to killing for hire. If you like the Mexican police, you'll love the Chicago PD without an entrance exam. |
| Posted by: Frozen Al 2010-01-07 11:31 |
| #9 No, what it does is de-legitimize the uniform; the authority a citizen gives a police officer. Complain as people do when ticketed etc. but the authority is given to a police officer because there is a certain level of training and behavior that person must achieve in order to carry a badge. But maybe it will avert legal battles, "Your honor, my client was wrongfully arrested!" "The officer was clearly not legally held to any standard of understanding the local laws and therefore cannot be held responsible for his behavior and/or misunderstanding of local procedures. Case dismissed." |
| Posted by: swksvolFF 2010-01-07 11:15 |
| #8 A good resolution could come to this if the police start to recognize the need to create the equivalent of R.O.T.C. in the colleges. Right now, the track goes differently, from criminal justice major to patrolman, then patrolman for years until promoted to lieutenant. Instead they need a dual track, the equivalent of NCOs and officers. Like the military, this preserves the promotions from the ranks, in the "command" structure, but it also creates something of an administrative "officer corps", uniformed administrators that hold mid level management police jobs, and are separate from the "N.C.O. chain of command." Currently a lot of those jobs are held by "civilians", who just do generic OTJ training for fairly specialized work. But as the military learned a long time ago, the better the administrative and logistics support mechanism works, the better combat personnel can perform their mission. |
| Posted by: Anonymoose 2010-01-07 08:13 |
| #7 More social engineering at work, the 'dumbing down' of America. What's the drop out rate of Chicago? 30/40%?? Too many unqualified minorities to 'fit the bill'. WGN Chic news last nite had poll, 89% against this. |
| Posted by: Tom- Pa 2010-01-07 07:57 |
| #6 Equality of Opportunity versus Equality of Outcome [aka socialism] |
| Posted by: Procopius2k 2010-01-07 07:31 |
| #5 But wait! What if the more desired applicant entrance testing scores could be set very, very low, say at the 45% or 55% minimum passing level and other, less desired applicants could be systematically excluded by elevating their minimum passing scores higher, say for instance at the 97% or 98% levels? A range of minimum scores could be established should recruitment objectives involve a range of differing applicants. Of course a few of the undesirable applicants would still 'game the system' through high scoring achievement and sneak through. You might then design a weighted oral interview follow-up phase, where the desired applicants could be given additional bonus points for "life experience" or "cultural appititude, race, gendor" or other unique skills and attributes not generally found in initially in the higher scoring non-desireable applicant. Of course this techique would involve a great deal of reading, math, and additional effort by the testing staff. Therefore, the testing staff should be selected on the basis of their ability to fully understand the testing system and entrance goals, read and write, add and subtract, exercise confidentiality, etc. It will also be helpful if they are identical in appearance as possible to the desired applicant. I know this really never been done before, out-of-the-box thinking, but I just thought I might offer it. |
| Posted by: Besoeker 2010-01-07 05:06 |
| #4 What next? Do away with rules like "no drug convictions" or "no felony convictions"? I mean, those practices discriminate against the criminals who want to turn their lives around, or those who have "experience" in the criminal justice system. |
| Posted by: Cornsilk Blondie 2010-01-07 04:43 |
| #3 Dropping the exam would bolster minority hiring USA heading to being reverse Suid Afrika? |
| Posted by: g(r)omgoru 2010-01-07 04:09 |
| #2 Jeebus, how many people are going to have to die before this nation wakes up to the liberal insanity? |
| Posted by: Rex Mundi 2010-01-07 00:49 |
| #1 If this happens it will not end well. |
| Posted by: tipover 2010-01-07 00:20 |