Police Dispatcher Training For a Demanding Job

Police dispatchers are required as a part of the job to deal with stress related 911 calls, to be able to deal with people in a emergency situation in a calm and controlled manner is a basic requirement of becoming a police dispatcher. The stress testing criteria as part of the police dispatchers training is designed to remove from their training people who cannot handle this stressful part of the job. Today's police dispatchers have a host of tools available to them that help make their job a lot easier, computers, detailed maps, access to very large databases, and GPS, (Global Position Satellite services), all these are designed, especially the GPS to enable a police dispatcher find the nearest location of the many law enforcement personnel to be able to respond to a call in a speedy manner. The police dispatcher is trained to dispatch correct number of units and appropriate type in response to a call for  necessary assistance. A police dispatcher is also responsible to see to the protection of the police officers on their watch, by giving them the maximum information to prevent their officers going into unknown dangerous situation. Everyday normal incidents like a lost puppy or a cats in trees are the lighter side of being a police dispatcher, it gives relieve when diaily incidents get especially stressful.  Random acts of violence, spousal abuse, rape, murder, child neglect and child abuse, robbery, drive-by shootings, gang fights are the biggest stress factors that both police officers and a police dispatcher will have to deal with daily. Extensive training on these related subjects are extremely tense and not everyone is able to handle this. Police dispatcher schools have similar stress training methods; they cover both the legal aspects of the verbal responses, plus the necessary wording of the responses.  For instance a caller is threatening to commit suicide; there are process systems in place on the appropriate responses to the caller. Material presented bypolice dispatcher  schools contains both audio and visual type of prompts.  Simulators are also used by many of the police dispatcher training schools.  The simulators have a mixture of live material and orchestrated (using actors) material to teach dispatcher the various aspects of the job. With increasing populations and many more aged people to deal The demand for all emergency service has increased putting even more stress on police dispatchers. Some call centres have consolidated their emergency services such as police, ambulance, and other related emergency services,  which does make it a lot easier in some respect but has also place greater stress on the police dispatcher as this creates a variety of intense emergency situations a dispatcher is required to deal with. Other situations although not quite as stressful require a dispatcher to deal with very irate passengers when a bus breaks down, call maintenance department to deal with the breakdown, and arrange for alternative bus to collect the passengers. Other events on a transit situation are fights on a bus, medical situations add to a dispatcher daily routine.  The present job rate of police dispatchers is increasing by 18%, with over 100,000 police dispatcher is the United States, to keep up with the demand for dispatcher to fulfil posts vacated buy dispatchers leaving, and there is a growing demand for more police dispatcher training schools.