Police Academy Graduation

November 6, 2015

Darla and the girls celebrate with Jeff after his graduation from the Slidell Regional Police Academy. Jeff has used his sabbatical from the Seminary faculty to complete this Police Academy. He has been Chaplain for the Slidell Police Department since about 2011 and saw the fact of actually being a graduate of the Police Academy as enhancing his opportunity to minister to the Police Officers.

A dozen or so city and agency leaders were on the stage as Director of Training Eddie Lamulle introduced the proceedings. The graduates processed to the front of the auditorium.

After the pledge to the flag, Jeff as Chaplain was called upon for the Invocation.

The line of graduates stood before the audience of over a hundred family members and friends.

At this point the speaker had called upon the candidates to express appreciation to their families and friends who had supported them through the process of the Police Academy.

Next came the time for special awards such as obstacle course, marksmanship, etc. When it came to the certification exam, Jeff received the award for top mark on that exam.

There were two exams they had to pass, a Post exam and a state exam as I understood it. For the second exam, Jeff again had the top score.

Finally it was time for the awarding of the certificates. Jeff shakes hands with Eddie Lamulle, the Director of Training.

At the podium, announcing the graduates was Toni Gebbia, Training Coordinator.

Certificate time!

The graduates stand before the audience once more at the end of the graduation.

The family gets a view of the certificate.

Ashleigh, Elyse and Jordan with Jeff.

Jeff's badge arrived at the house on the afternoon just before the ceremony, so now he can officially wear it.

We got to see a series of slides of the training that took place during this session of the Police Academy. Here they are being trained on both adult CPR on the left and infant CPR on the right, so they got CPR certification in both.

Pepper spray!!

Now this is intense training! After being pepper sprayed in the face, Jeff had to get to the police vehicle, struggle with two guys who were trying to take his gun, and open the door of the police vehicle with the key. Finally they hosed him down to wash off the pepper spray.

This started with them putting him in a frame to contain the pepper spray and then just giving a brief pepper spray across the forehead. For a moment you could think, "Maybe this won't be so bad.", and then it hit you like a ton of bricks! With eyes and nose running like crazy, you still had to perform the tasks you might have to do on an actual crime scene.

These are just samples of the training. There was intense physical training and firearm training with both pistol and shotgun in a variety of settings. There were also various scenarios for dealing with persons who offered resistance or who attacked.