NIJ Training Tool Helps Chicago Police Learn Spanish

• NCJ Number: 242258
• Date Published: May 2012
• Author(s): National Law Enforcement and Corrections Technology Center
• Agencies: NIJ-Sponsored
• Award: Operate the National Law Enforcement and Corrections Technology Center (NLECTC) - National Center

Annotation

This article describes a training tool to assist the Chicago Police Department in learning Spanish.

Abstract

The online tool, Espanol for Law Enforcement: An Interactive Training Tool, is designed to provide officers with a working knowledge of Spanish that they can use at crime scenes, during interviews, at traffic stops, and during domestic violence situations. The course covers the fundamentals of the language as well as arrest commands and phrases helpful for obtaining descriptions of suspects from victims and witnesses. Since the tools development and launch in 2010 more than 1,000 officers from the Chicago Police Department have taken the course. Course participation is voluntary. Feedback from participants has been favorable with officers suggesting that the same program should be developed for other languages.