Community College of Aurora restarts police education with APD cadet program

AURORA | A path for Aurora students to become police officers is once again taking shape at Community College of Aurora, as the school plans to welcome up to 20 cadets who would be fast-tracked into a career with the city’s police department.

Starting this fall, the school’s partnership with the Aurora Police Department would allow cadets to earn an associate’s degree of their choice while participating in a two-year “apprenticeship” with APD that would include a handful of days each month accompanying and learning from officers.

Cadets will also take part in a week-long “boot camp” and work in a non-sworn capacity for the city — for example, helping to manage parking at events — according to Bobby Pace, vice president of academic success at Community College of Aurora.

The program will cover the cost of cadets’ schooling if they go on to work for at least three years at APD. Pace said the four semesters of tuition and books, worth about $12,000, will be paid for using donations and contributions from the Aurora Police Association Charitable Foundation as well as by the college itself.

“The selling point for us was that it ensures the programming we provide directly does lead to economic and social mobility for the students within Aurora,” Pace said. “Students are truly going to get a free education with a direct pipeline to be able to serve the community.”

Cadets who complete the program and are unable or do not want to continue down the path of becoming a police officer may also choose to work for the City of Aurora for three years to have their schooling paid for.

Community College of Aurora was home to its own police academy until last year, when it was allowed to sunset amid a decline in enrollment as more departments in the Denver metro area ramped up their own in-house academies, according to Pace.

Police spokesman Joe Moylan said the idea for the new partnership developed in 2022 under former interim chief Dan Oates, who Pace said was familiar with similar programs that served as pipelines for the New York Police Department.

While both the college and police department hope to open up career paths in Aurora for Aurorans, undertaking recruitment in such a way that the city’s sworn officer force more closely resembles the community as a whole is one of the specific goals of APD’s reform agreement with the Colorado Attorney General’s Office.

“We have heard from community members that, in addition to seeing themselves reflected in the officers who serve Aurora, they want the department to be (composed) of more ‘home-grown’ officers,” Moylan wrote in an email.

“We also recognize that the student bodies of community colleges tend to be made up of people who grew up and live in the community. We think people who grew up, live and understand Aurora provide unique advantages to serving the community.”

Since the reform agreement was signed, APD has introduced efforts like the 30×30 Initiative, pledging to raise the portion of women in recruit classes to at least 30% by 2030, and stepped up community outreach to encourage women and people of color, both historically underrepresented among Aurora police officers, to apply.

Recruitment is one area of the agreement where APD is making visible progress. Earlier this year, the department reported that the three classes completing academy training represented the largest group of recruits to progress through the academy at once since at least 2020. Demographically, the group was closer to the makeup of the community as a whole.

Moylan and Pace also called attention to the fact that one of the requirements for promotion to higher ranks within the department is education beyond high school, meaning the cadet program has the potential to train the next generation of leaders within APD.

“You must have, at minimum, an associate’s degree to promote to supervisory positions in the department,” Moylan wrote. “By helping cadets earn their degree, we are laying the foundation for them to have a long and successful career in law enforcement, as well as attracting the future leaders of APD.”

Cadet candidates must be at least 18, are expected to maintain a grade point average of 2.5 or higher for the duration of the program and can’t have earned more than 12 college credit hours previously. They also can’t have been convicted of a felony or any other crime that would prevent them from being certified by the Colorado Peace Officer Standards and Training Board.

Moylan said cadets will be pre-screened before entering the program and undergo the department’s full background investigation and screening process before they are formally offered a job.

Applications are being accepted until June 6 for the first cadet class, which will begin Aug. 19 and start training with Aurora police Aug. 23. Information about the program and application process is available at buff.ly/3QocscM.

“It has really become an opportunity for us to have a great pipeline for students who are interested in law enforcement and want to work here in the community and stay in Aurora,” Pace said.