NIJ’s Law Enforcement Advancing Data and Science (LEADS) Program

Speaking in this video:

• Hassan Aden, Director, Research and Programs, The International Association of Chiefs of Police
• Nancy Rodriquez, Director, National Institute of Justice
• Mark Landahl, Ph.D., 2014 LEADS Scholar, Sergeant, Frederick (MD) County Sheriff’s Office
• Tim Mac Gillis, 2014 LEADS Scholar, Police Lieutenant, Milwaukee Police Department

Hassan Aden, Director, Research and Programs, The International Association of Chiefs of Police: The important of the LEADS scholarship program is that it brings mid-level career police officials that are going to be the future of our field—they’re going to be the future chiefs and senior commanders. But they come in—they’re incredibly smart—but they come in with research as part of their skill set. It’s part of what they value. So they are, by default, bringing research into policing.

Nancy Rodriquez, Director, National Institute of Justice: We’ve also jointly worked on the LEADS scholar program, which allows us to fund and invest in the mid-level officers who are interested in pursuing their professional careers using science.

Mark Landahl, Ph.D., 2014 LEADS Scholar, Sergeant, Frederick (MD) County Sheriff’s Office: The LEADS program has helped my professional development by providing access to experts, things that maybe necessarily that in my own research that I haven’t been exposed to, but  it broadened the opportunity to bring some things back to the agency.

Tim Mac Gillis, 2014 LEADS Scholar, Police Lieutenant, Milwaukee Police Department: The LEADS program has helped my professional development by allowing me to collaborate with subject matter experts and practitioners from throughout the country who share the same interests in practicum and also application into academic research. It’s been a great experience. I’ve done a number of research projects in my own agency and collaborate with the first group of LEADS.

Mark Landahl, Ph.D.: In particular, for me, I’ve had a lot of interest with things going on nationally about procedural justice and how we can do things better. And to be having the access to the experts here, the people who wrote the papers that informed the theories of the things that we do, and getting back to the things that we need to do better, has been a great experience.

Nancy Rodriquez: We hope to be able to in many ways scale the program in ways that we know are going to have not only just a short-term impact on the professional development of these officers, but also their long-term trajectories. I’m excited to see what they do in their respective law enforcement agencies and in the communities they serve.