The national police launched its annual recruitment campaign this week with the aim of training 2,500 future peacekeepers who will benefit from an education extended to 12 months and enriched with new content to be “in tune with society”.
Training reduced to 8 months in 2020
Since June 2020, training in a police academy had been reduced to 8 months, a “fundamental error” had estimated the Minister of the Interior Gérald Darmanin at the National Assembly a few months later, just after the Michel Zecler affair, a black music producer beaten by police.
This extension of schooling was announced in the fall during the closure of Beauvau security by President Emmanuel Macron.
During the twelve months at the police academy, the students will do four weeks of work-study training, including one in an investigation service. On leaving school, they will go on training for a year (compared to 16 months previously) in their assigned department.
This new schooling should make it possible to “better respond to the challenges of an ever more efficient, better trained police force, in tune with society”, said the General Directorate of the National Police (DGPN) on Friday in a press release.
Teaching enriched with new subjects
Future police officers will benefit from new content such as “the protection of people with disabilities, the problem of unaccompanied minors, cross-border crime or animal abuse”.
Lessons related to “questions of secularism and religions, the fight against discrimination and support for victims” are also on the program.
“In the coming months”, the students will be able to obtain, at the end of their training, the qualification of “judicial police officer” (OPJ), in order to strengthen the investigative capacities of the police.
Launched on Tuesday, registration is open until July 22.