**Abstract**

This chapter outlines the historical development of police education in the United Kingdom, more precisely in England and Wales, and highlights new strategies and planning for the professional development of the police. There is a plethora of research carried out regarding professionalism in policing to meet the needs and challenges of the twenty-first century. Considering the recent developments in police education and training, this chapter mainly discusses three newly introduced routes for recruitment and education of police constables under the Policing Education Qualifications Framework (PEQF), namely Police Constable Degree Apprenticeship (PCDA), Degree Holder Entry Programme (DHEP), and Pre-Join Degree (PJD). Higher education institutions (HEIs), in partnership with the police forces, are providing professional qualifications for policing as a graduate level profession. Though they have made remarkable progress in developing police education programmes, they are facing various challenges in implementing the qualification framework. This chapter also explores pedagogical aspects of police education including the effectiveness and contrast between different forms of teaching and learning. While featuring the challenges and prospects of the new police education programmes, this chapter also outlines different aspects of partnership for delivering these professional qualification programmes.

**Keywords:** police education, Policing Education Qualification Framework (PEQF), Police Constable Degree Apprenticeship (PCDA), Degree Holder Entry Programme (DHEP), Pre-Join Degree (PJD), United Kingdom

#### **1. Introduction**

In recent years, professionalisation has become a critical discourse [1–4] for the development of police forces in the United Kingdom. As a result, moving away from traditional training programmes towards more formal higher education programmes has been seen as a way of progress to develop professionalism within the police force [5]. In light of recent development in the field of policing, modernisation became the key concern for workforce development to fulfil the demands of the twenty-first century. The changing nature of policing and the complexity of police work became an integral part of police studies discourse [6, 7]. Recent studies show that having a higher education degree tends to have a more significant impact on police officers' knowledge and appreciation of the values and lifestyles of peoples from different cultures, especially minority groups and immigrants [8, 9]. Therefore, the professional academic education programme has been suggested as a vital tool for the development of police forces in the United Kingdom [10].

In February 2016, the College of Policing, the national professional body for policing in England and Wales, introduced the Policing Education Qualifications Framework (PEQF) for developing academic programmes for the 43 police forces in England and Wales. The PEQF proposed different routes for providing education, namely Police Constable Degree Apprenticeship (PCDA), Degree Holder Entry Programme (DHEP), and Pre-Join Degree (PJD), in professional policing practice [11, 12]. Student officers are recruited by the forces for the PCDA and DHEP routes on a salaried full-time 40 hours per week contract. Within their contract hours, they have to engage 20% of their time for off-the-job learning with a partner university, being students of an enrolled programme [12, 13].

Several police forces have already launched the PCDA programmes in partnership with several universities. On 7 September 2018, Nottinghamshire Police nationally pioneered the PCDA programme with their first cohort in partnership with the University of Derby. This initiative was followed by Derbyshire Police who then ran their first cohort of the PCDA programme with the same university. Then throughout the year in 2019, some other forces such as Leicestershire, Northamptonshire, South Wales, Gwent, Dyfed-Powys, West Midlands, Northumbria, Avon and Somerset, Staffordshire, Merseyside, and Sussex started running the PCDA programme [14]. These programmes, in fact, shifted the nature of police education and training with a particular focus on theoretical knowledge linking with the professional practice of police work with less or no emphasis on physical education. The primary mission for drastically changing police education and training is to make policing a graduate level occupation [14]. It is not only to replace the Initial Police Learning and Development Programme (IPLDP) or give all officers a university degree, but also to make the officers academically and professionally sound for the complex challenges they face in contemporary policing.

It is not an easy task to transform the century-old traditional police training to the university education programmes over a period of 2–3 years. Due to this transition in developing professional qualifications, both the forces and the higher education institutions (HEIs) are facing challenges in tackling different practical and pedagogical issues in implementing new programmes. On the one hand, the police forces are traditionally conservative [15–17] as Reiner ([18], p. 130) claims that the majority of police officers are conservative 'both politically and morally' and the students of these programmes are the trainee officers of a disciplined force [19, 20]. On the other hand, universities are very much student-focused to ensure the best learning experience for every individual student and encourage them to be critical about their learning journey and broaden their horizons. To run an academic programme successfully, HEIs are required to comply with the frameworks of the Institute for Apprenticeships and Technical Education and other funding requirements, for example from the Education and Skills Funding Agency (ESFA) as well as strictly maintaining academic regulations including Quality Assurance (QA) process and satisfy the Office for Students (OfS). Therefore, HEIs have to be in continuous conversations with the partner forces to solve the problems associated with teaching, delivery, and assessment as they arise.

Despite the fact that the Peelian objectives of policing were to ensure safety and security of person and property with the help of the community as well as prevent and detect crime [21], policing around the world became an 'extraordinarily complex endeavour' [22] due to changing demands and new challenges including technological advancement and changing patterns of crimes [23]. Police Officers do

**5**

*Police Education in the United Kingdom: Challenges and Future Directions*

**2. Historical development of police education and training**

not spend a great deal of time in dealing with theft, robbery, and burglary that they did in the earlier days. Nowadays they deal with rapidly evolving crime threats such as terrorism, cybercrime, and serious and organised crime. Yet for the public, their role as citizens in uniform and bobbies on the beat as portrayed in the ever popular BBC series 'Dixon of Dock Green' (1955–1976) has not been lost as they still need to help the people whenever necessary. This is especially the case when austerity has meant a reduction to other public services in the UK leading to increasing demand on the police service, for example assistance with mental health-related incidents [24]. Yet, there was a saying 'if you want to know the time, ask a policeman' ([18], p. 78), people still call the police to help them with non-crime incidents even to buy

The role of a police constable is one of the oldest professions in Great Britain as its history dates back to 1285 Statute of Winchester, attestation of constables following an Act of Parliament in 1673, Bow Street Runners of 1749, the establishment of the City of Glasgow Police in 1800 and finally the creation of a full-time formal police organisation for London, the Metropolitan Police, in 1829. However, the establishment of the Metropolitan Police, a brainchild of the then Home Secretary Sir Robert Peel, who later served as a British Prime Minister, is seen as the introduction of the 'modern' public policing in the world; as a result, policing became a career that offered status and security at the end of the nineteenth

It was after 100 years since the establishment of the Metropolitan Police, serious efforts were made to develop police training. The Metropolitan Police College at Hendon was established in 1934 as a military-style institution with the intention to train the serving and newly recruited officers for senior rank. The idea originally came from the Indian Police Service (IPS) that used to recruit officers in senior ranks called probationer Assistant Superintendent of Police. The Assistant Commander of the College was seconded from the IPS. In five intakes, 188 officers were graduated from the college to become inspectors until the institution was closed in September 1939. The college was not re-opened in the same format after the Second World War. Instead, in June 1948, the new National Police College (known as the Police Staff College since 1979) was established at Ryton-on-

Dunsmore, near Coventry, to run different training courses for higher ranking officers with potentials to become senior police officers [26]. The college ran residential and non-residential junior, senior, and short courses and also overseas command courses for promising officers, and a scholarship scheme was available [27, 28].

Turning to the London Metropolitan Police 'was the first modern police force in a nation with representative government' ([29], ix) and the British bobbies 'occupy a special place in the history of policing in the world' and was 'a role model of successful policing' ([30], p. 435). The initial recruit training played a great role in turning an ordinary citizen into a uniformed policeman. The Metropolitan Police Training School for constables was established at Peel House in Regency Street, Pimlico in 1907, which was there until 1974, and the Metropolitan Police College in Hendon was rebuilt and opened in 1974, popularly known as the Peel Centre [31]. Historically, initial police training was known as the foundation training or basic police training in the UK, which was followed by police organisations around the world, in particular, in former British colonies. Many national police forces such as the Bangladesh Police still run the same initial police training for the new recruits. After World War II, the specialist cadet college for direct entry senior officers for

*DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.92705*

some groceries for vulnerable residents.

century [25].

#### *Police Education in the United Kingdom: Challenges and Future Directions DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.92705*

*Education, Human Rights and Peace in Sustainable Development*

impact on police officers' knowledge and appreciation of the values and lifestyles of peoples from different cultures, especially minority groups and immigrants [8, 9]. Therefore, the professional academic education programme has been suggested as a

In February 2016, the College of Policing, the national professional body for policing in England and Wales, introduced the Policing Education Qualifications Framework (PEQF) for developing academic programmes for the 43 police forces in England and Wales. The PEQF proposed different routes for providing education, namely Police Constable Degree Apprenticeship (PCDA), Degree Holder Entry Programme (DHEP), and Pre-Join Degree (PJD), in professional policing practice [11, 12]. Student officers are recruited by the forces for the PCDA and DHEP routes on a salaried full-time 40 hours per week contract. Within their contract hours, they have to engage 20% of their time for off-the-job learning with a partner

Several police forces have already launched the PCDA programmes in partnership with several universities. On 7 September 2018, Nottinghamshire Police nationally pioneered the PCDA programme with their first cohort in partnership with the University of Derby. This initiative was followed by Derbyshire Police who then ran their first cohort of the PCDA programme with the same university. Then throughout the year in 2019, some other forces such as Leicestershire, Northamptonshire, South Wales, Gwent, Dyfed-Powys, West Midlands, Northumbria, Avon and Somerset, Staffordshire, Merseyside, and Sussex started running the PCDA programme [14]. These programmes, in fact, shifted the nature of police education and training with a particular focus on theoretical knowledge linking with the professional practice of police work with less or no emphasis on physical education. The primary mission for drastically changing police education and training is to make policing a graduate level occupation [14]. It is not only to replace the Initial Police Learning and Development Programme (IPLDP) or give all officers a university degree, but also to make the officers academically and professionally sound for the

It is not an easy task to transform the century-old traditional police training to the university education programmes over a period of 2–3 years. Due to this transition in developing professional qualifications, both the forces and the higher education institutions (HEIs) are facing challenges in tackling different practical and pedagogical issues in implementing new programmes. On the one hand, the police forces are traditionally conservative [15–17] as Reiner ([18], p. 130) claims that the majority of police officers are conservative 'both politically and morally' and the students of these programmes are the trainee officers of a disciplined force [19, 20]. On the other hand, universities are very much student-focused to ensure the best learning experience for every individual student and encourage them to be critical about their learning journey and broaden their horizons. To run an academic programme successfully, HEIs are required to comply with the frameworks of the Institute for Apprenticeships and Technical Education and other funding requirements, for example from the Education and Skills Funding Agency (ESFA) as well as strictly maintaining academic regulations including Quality Assurance (QA) process and satisfy the Office for Students (OfS). Therefore, HEIs have to be in continuous conversations with the partner forces to solve the problems associated

Despite the fact that the Peelian objectives of policing were to ensure safety and security of person and property with the help of the community as well as prevent and detect crime [21], policing around the world became an 'extraordinarily complex endeavour' [22] due to changing demands and new challenges including technological advancement and changing patterns of crimes [23]. Police Officers do

vital tool for the development of police forces in the United Kingdom [10].

university, being students of an enrolled programme [12, 13].

complex challenges they face in contemporary policing.

with teaching, delivery, and assessment as they arise.

**4**

not spend a great deal of time in dealing with theft, robbery, and burglary that they did in the earlier days. Nowadays they deal with rapidly evolving crime threats such as terrorism, cybercrime, and serious and organised crime. Yet for the public, their role as citizens in uniform and bobbies on the beat as portrayed in the ever popular BBC series 'Dixon of Dock Green' (1955–1976) has not been lost as they still need to help the people whenever necessary. This is especially the case when austerity has meant a reduction to other public services in the UK leading to increasing demand on the police service, for example assistance with mental health-related incidents [24]. Yet, there was a saying 'if you want to know the time, ask a policeman' ([18], p. 78), people still call the police to help them with non-crime incidents even to buy some groceries for vulnerable residents.
