Improving Cultural Competency

At the National Organization of Retired State Troopers, we strive to promote training and community-oriented strategies for law enforcement officers in cultural competency. Cultural competence, at its core,  is the ability to understand, communicate with, and effectively interact with people across a variety of cultures. By being aware of the limitations of one's own world view, officers can have better, and more positive interactions with the general public. By helping officers to develop positive attitudes towards cultural differences by providing knowledge of different cultural practices and world views, we hope to make the relationship between officers and their communities much stronger.  

By identifying racial bias factors in police-citizen contacts, we can help to alleviate and reduce incidents of racial and cultural prejudice in law enforcement. This, along with other techniques, allows us to help improve officer safety practices in urban communities. Further by providing career training, and mentoring, we are able to promote growth opportunities for minority law enforcement officers through seminars, workshops, identification, and dissemination of promotional job opportunities. By working with up and coming officers, or members of the community who are interested in law enforcement, we are able to help guide future generations of law enforcement through all stages of their career.

This allows for an ever-strengthening bond between law enforcement and the community, as officers learn how to best manage interactions with the community, and community members are mentored into becoming new officers. This is done through provisioning of social media training articles and conducting educational speaking engagements in collaboration with organization members, local community groups, law enforcement associations, and other nonprofit community service organizations. By working together to educate everyone on better community-oriented strategies with a foundation in cultural competency, we hope to help make all of our communities a safer place to live and work.