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EYES ON THE CITY

High Caliber Cadets

MCC Law Enforcement Academy offers rigorous training

by Kathleen McKinney

The general public probably has no idea of

the extensive amount of training that our
local peace officers go through. Honestly,
until I met someone actually attending the
McLennan Community College Law
Enforcement Academy, the thought never
crossed my mind.
I think its important to every citizen,
whether theyre interested in law enforcement
or not, just understanding how that training
occurs and what you can expect from it, said
Tamara Ballmann, division chair of Emergency
Services Education Center [ESEC].
The MCC Law Enforcement Academy is
housed in the ESEC, which is off campus on
Steinbeck Bend Drive. This facility is used
specifically for training individuals in emergency services fields, including paramedics,
firefighters and law enforcement officers. The
building is also home to MCCs criminal justice,
forensic science and emergency medical services programs.
MCCs academy offers a licensing course for
Texas peace officers, and the course prepares
students for the Texas Commission on Law
Enforcement Officer Standards and Education
(TCLEOSE) exam and beyond.
We make sure that our cadets get all the
required training and then some, said Lt.
Photo by Cameron Slanina

Gary Myles, assistant coordinator of the MCC

MCC Law Enforcement Academy cadets practice handling firearms.

70 Wacoan { Wacos City Magazine

Law Enforcement Academy. The state

requires about 648 training hours mandated
by the state, by TCLEOSE, but we get in about
704, 705 hours of training. Plus, we give an
additional 48 hours of opportunity to study
for the state exam. Thats why they do as well

as they do.
The 2012 spring academy class marked the
10th MCC Law Enforcement Academy class in a
row to have a 100 percent pass rate on the
state exam, and not all academies can claim
that record. There are more than 100 training
providers in the state of Texas, and while
TCLEOSE no longer ranks the academies, when
the agency did, the MCC program was consistently in the top 10 according to Myles.
The MCC academy isnt exactly new.
According to Ballmann, the academy was established sometime in the 1960s, around the time
MCC itself was founded, which was in 1965.
Over the years, there were some issues,
maybe with just the quality, Ballmann said.
Eventually, the academy became defunct. It
wasnt until 2005 that it was able to get back
on its feet.
Major Danny Smith [a retired Texas
Department of Public Safety major], back in 05,
was contacted by one of our deans to renew
and rebirth the academy. We worked with
[Waco Police Department], who had their own
academy at the time, and with [Woodway Police
Department] to make sure there was that partnership and that they had confidence in what
we were doing out here, and now its just taken
off.
Waco PD no longer has its own academy.
Today, the agency, along with many other local
agencies, sends its recruits to the MCC academy to be trained.
We train for any police agency that wants
to send their people to this academy, Myles
said. For instance, Waco PD, the [McLennan
County Sheriffs Office], they hire the people.
When they need to be trained, they send them
here, and we train them. Once they graduate,
they get commissioned, and theyre ready to go
to work.
The academy also accepts independents.
These are regular students who are not yet
employed by an agency, but hope to one day
become police officers. And several graduates
have been hired. In the last four years, the
academy has graduated 255 students, and 203
are employed in a law enforcement profession.
Agencies from all over Texas have hired graduates from MCCs academy, including Texas
Parks & Wildlife and local police departments

72 Wacoan { Wacos City Magazine

such as Waco, Woodway, Bellmead, MCC, TSTC

and the sheriffs office. One reason why agencies so readily hire graduates from this academy is because of the caliber of its instructors
and advisors.
With the rebirth of the academy, an advisory
board was put together to oversee the training.
The current committee consists of several local
police chiefs, including City of Woodway Public
Safety Director Yost Zakhary, who is the committees chairperson, as well as a few civilians.
The advisory board ensures that the academy is
adhering to the standards set by the state as
well as the board itself.
Just as the advisory board is comprised of
several different agencies, the instructors also
are from a mix of agencies as well.
Our instructors are people that have been
there, done that or currently doing it. Myles
said. [The cadets] are not just trained the DPS
way or the Waco PD way. They get training
from a good variety of agencies so they get a
broad spectrum of what its really like to be in
law enforcement. When they set it up and
reestablished the academy, the advisory board
didnt want it to be slanted from one agency.
They wanted a variety of agencies to come in.
Each section of the course is taught by a different instructor and agency. Myles, a retired
DPS highway patrol lieutenant, teaches the
course sections on traffic code and multiculturalism. Sgt. Stephen Beatty, a retired Waco sergeant and the academys coordinator, teaches
the section on the U.S. Constitution. Guest lecturers teach other sections such as the code of
criminal procedure, penal code, patrol, civil
process, crash investigation, defensive tactics,
firearms training and driving.
We probably have well over 200 years of
combined law enforcement experience that
come in and do the instructing for us, Myles
said. Its just a great network of people and
priorities that has come together and given us
the success rate that we have here.
In addition to classroom instruction, the
cadets receive quite a bit of physical, hands-on
instruction. Three days a week, the cadets have
physical training (PT), which consists of aerobic
and weight training exercises. Initially, PT is
lead by Myles and Beatty, but after the third or
fourth week, the academy brings in Sgt.

Aug 2012 } Wacoan.com 73

Andrew Hermes.
Hes our Arnold Schwarzenegger guy,
Myles said. Hes a DPS agent, and hes bigtime on physical training. We talk him up a lot.
Hes a physical specimen. One of the nicest
guys youll ever meet, but you dont want to get
into a physical confrontation with him.
Hermes trains the cadets twice a week in a
cross-fit style fitness program.
Its very rigorous. When the cadets leave
here, they have probably been in the most challenging physical aspects of training that theyve
ever gone through and probably ever will go
through, Myles said.
After a few weeks in the classroom, the
cadets get into the mechanics of arrest, where
they learn a lot of the hands-on work that
police officers do including how to restrain and
handcuff someone. The cadets also spend two
weeks at the firing range, which is located next
to the ESEC and overseen by Waco PD. Those
same two weeks, over at Waco Regional
Airport, the cadets learn pursuit driving and
how to handle and maneuver police vehicles.
Once they get the driving down, the cadets
learn how to work patrol stops with Lacy
Lakeviews Chief of Police Dennis Stapleton.
Thats the fun part because theyve been
locked into the classroom for so long. Now,
they get a chance to get out and really enjoy
the mechanical part of being police officers,
Myles said.
The academy is a 19-week course, Monday
through Friday from 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. MCC offers
three academies a year, a spring, summer and
fall class called A, B and C. The 2012-B class is
currently in training and will graduate in
September. Hopefully, these cadets will be the
11th class in a row to achieve a 100 percent
pass rate.
Thanks to Major Danny Smith and our committee and Dr. Johnette McKown, president of
MCC, were able to do what we do. Im so happy
to be here because it is a good place to be.
They support what we do, Myles said. Still,
we couldnt be as successful as we are if it wasnt for the caliber of students we get, our
cadets.
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74 Wacoan { Wacos City Magazine