An innovative partnership of law enforcement and higher education.

Today, criminal justice administration requires an unprecedented level of sophistication. Accordingly, law enforcement agencies throughout the nation encourage their personnel to pursue professional degree programs. To this end, the Los Angeles County, California, Sheriff's Department teams with local colleges and universities to help its employees earn degrees, from the associate to the doctorate level.

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The agency partnered with Woodbury University in Burbank, California, to develop the innovative bachelor of arts in organizational leadership (BOL), which helps to develop leadership qualities in Los Angeles County sworn and civilian employees serving the area's diverse communities. The curriculum provides candidates the rigorous intellectual and practical training they need to identify and meet executive responsibilities toward both colleagues and the public.

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Other administrative arenas and urban areas may find the BOL a useful model to consider. Los Angeles County has over 95,000 budgeted workers representing law and justice, health care, and social services occupations; the program has graduates and current students from most of these specialties. (1) The county's diverse sectors make it a challenging but enlightening training ground for managerial and leadership skills applicable across the United States.

PROGRAM OVERVIEW

For entry to the program, candidates must have an associate degree or 75 semester units (some coursework can be completed after admission). All students work full time and have returned to school after an average of 10 years, some as many as 25. Individuals pursue the degree for personal growth, as well as for professional or financial reasons, while juggling academic, job, and family demands.

In this personally and academically intensive program, students progress through the courses as a cohort, attending weekly 4-hour workshops, completing course material in teams and individually, and graduating as a group. In 2 1/2 years, candidates complete 16 seven-week classes in sequence, each of which builds on information taught in previous courses.

COURSE CONTENT

Courses in the BOL program follow an order designed to identify and develop executive talents in students and prepare them for leadership roles in the public and private sectors. First, Leadership Theory and Practice I and II examine the history and evolving concepts of leadership, analyze elements of both successful and ineffective management, and compare leadership styles. Students scrutinize the executive qualities of a specific contemporary or historical figure. Then, they apply what they have learned about effective management by planning and directing a class discussion.

Building upon the leadership courses, the next two classes address supervisory concerns in public organizations. Critical Analysis and Decision Making considers the role of empirical analysis in developing public policy, while Leadership and Social Responsibility investigates ethical dilemmas faced in implementing such policies.

The next course, Organizational Structure: Private and Public Sectors, first uses sociological models to explore issues of diversity, structure versus openness, and personnel management (including conflict resolution and collective bargaining) in public organizations. Then, it compares these concerns with analogous ones in private-sector administration and helps class members distinguish the specific challenges of each organizational system.

After their exposure to diversity issues in the public and private sectors, candidates study Personnel Development and Organizational Culture, which covers such human resource management matters as recruiting, hiring, training, and retaining employees in a multicultural society. Then, Diversity and Organizational Culture teaches these future leaders of diverse groups to forge an inclusive climate.

As the development of any collective culture requires mutual comprehension, students next turn their attention to communication within organizations. While all BOL courses use contemporary communication theories, Leadership and Organizational Communication and Leadership and Interpersonal Communication investigate and apply the most cutting-edge research in the field. Coursework emphasizes all channels of interpersonal understanding: formal and informal communication, language and meaning theory, verbal and nonverbal communication, and the establishment of positive human relationships through communication.

Following candidates' study of communication, Leadership and Organizational Psychology explores the art of responsible and effective employee management. Students measure the contribution of worker well-being and satisfaction to the efficiency of any organization. Next, Leading Organizational Change expands participants' ability to establish a coherent team by introducing the skills needed to lead coworkers in an evolving agency: assessing a department's openness to innovation, instituting new policies and protocols, and overcoming the resistance to change. And, just as change characterizes organizational life, so does employee conflict. To this end, the next course, Managing Conflict and Labor Relations, focuses on the leader's role in handling disagreement, negotiating consensus, and building sustainable labor coalitions while advancing managerial objectives.

At this point, candidates can consider larger policy issues confronting organizational executives. Quantitative Methods I and II teach them accurate data analysis techniques for researching and evaluating products and services. The classes inculcate skills in observation and interviewing, data collection and recording, and reading and writing research reports. But, because information alone cannot produce decisions, students next learn how organizational leaders use their knowledge to envision and enact long-range projects. Accordingly, Strategic Planning and Assessment trains participants to create and develop comprehensive courses of action. Competencies practiced include documenting, implementing, and assessing the success of strategic long-term plans. Proficiency in these steps prepares students to conclude their instruction with an original capstone project.

The Capstone in Organizational Leadership course synthesizes and applies not only the material of all preceding classes but also the candidates' considerable professional experience. Theory and practice coalesce in students' final projects, which relate what they have learned about leadership, communication, data analysis, cultural diversity, psychology, and organizational structure to their personal and professional aims. In addition to being free from errors in mechanics and verbiage, the capstone paper must demonstrate a candidate's ability to generate complex ideas and integrate them in a lucid thesis, using logical organization and cogent arguments. Thus, students culminate the program by displaying essential qualities of leadership: a strong sense of self, clear aims for the community, strategic skills to realize goals, and the facility to convey all of these to others. Even more important, articulating the knowledge participants have gained and the values they hold helps them implement what they have envisioned for themselves, their families, and the communities they serve.

PROGRAM EFFECTIVENESS

Focus on Student Needs

BOL students present a range of experiences and needs considerably wider than those of typical university undergraduates, a fact that faculty and staff address with flexibility and sensitivity. To begin with, entering candidates have earned and financed a considerable amount of college units; thus, they receive a generous tuition reduction. Further, these adult students hold full-time jobs. Some have undergone extremely hazardous incidents at work, occasionally involving injuries to themselves or fellow department members. Others have worked field command positions, perhaps overseeing evacuations during Southern California's wildfire season or addressing a variety of threats to public safety. And, many participants manage family-related circumstances, such as pregnancies and difficult situations involving their children. The faculty and administration of the BOL program have proved responsive to individual needs without compromising university standards. For example, two pregnant students on bed rest missed significant class time but, with faculty support, completed all requirements for graduation.

BOL enrollment has reflected the demographics of the surrounding communities. And, many of these students are the first in their families to pursue higher education or complete a degree. Woodbury's faculty values this socially aware program and continually refines both methods and curricula to keep its instruction pertinent and accessible to all county employees.

Responsiveness to Participant Evaluations

To meet program goals, the BOL faculty instituted assessment mechanisms that illuminate participants' academic and personal experiences while pursuing the degree. During the last class session of each cohort, student surveys elicit feedback about the length, workload, and applicability of each course, as well as candidates' motivations for enrollment.

Recently gathered data revealed that 82 percent of participants approved of the length of the classes. Similarly, 90 percent of graduates found the workload appropriate. Concerning the relevance of the courses to law enforcement work, 55 percent of the students use the material almost daily, and an additional 14 percent apply the information at least weekly. Students' motivations for pursuing the degree varied. While 77 percent viewed it as a means for career improvement (e.g., promotion, transfer, or better job), most participants reported a combination of aims, including personal growth and increased leadership skills in the criminal justice and social service fields.

To guarantee the continued applicability of course material to law enforcement, faculty members also solicited candidates' proposals for new classes and have adopted several. For example, participants' recommendation that the curriculum broaden to include private-sector organizations inspired the addition of the Organizational Structure: Private and Public Sectors course. Other suggestions have enriched the existing curriculum and tied it more closely to students' career paths. Balancing these innovations, however, the BOL retains its core substantive and methodological features, continuing to integrate a broad range of social sciences into a focus on leadership and to provide a coherent sequence of courses to guide cohorts of candidates.

ALUMNI SUCCESS

Participants have found the BOL valuable. The program treats candidates as multifaceted human beings whose education draws on and increases their professional and personal accomplishments.

The vast majority of BOL enrollees master the program requirements. Since the first cohort in the fall of 2002, 90 percent of students have completed the program. Of those who have earned the degree, approximately 25 percent received promotions or won transfers to leadership positions of their choice. And, they cite the program as a crucial component in achieving their goals. Both the graduation rate and the rewards of degree completion provide evidence that the BOL enhances the leadership abilities and professional development of its students.

CONCLUSION

Woodbury University's Bachelor of Arts in Organizational Leadership has proven its worth both to employees of Los Angeles County and to the varied groups they serve. The BOL helps students by honing the executive and diplomatic talents they need to guide organizations in a complex, diverse society and, thereby, also benefits the community.

This successful program serves as a model for other localities and institutions. Criminal justice organizations should consider using similar training programs to define and develop the qualities of their leaders in today's complex environment.

Endnotes

(1) http://www.lacounty.info

RELATED ARTICLE: Bachelor of Arts in Organizational Leadership Course Sequence

1. Leadership Theory and Practice I

2. Leadership Theory and Practice II

3. Critical Analysis and Decision Making

4. Leadership and Social Responsibility

5. Organizational Structure: Private and Public Sectors

6. Personnel Development and Organizational Culture

7. Diversity and Organizational Culture

8. Leadership and Organizational Communication

9. Leadership and Interpersonal Communication

10. Leadership and Organizational Psychology

11. Leading Organizational Change

12. Managing Conflict and Labor Relations

13. Quantitative Methods I

14. Quantitative Methods II

15. Strategic Planning and Assessment

16. Capstone in Organizational Leadership

For Additional Information

http://www.woodbury.edu

Dr. Hellman is an assistant professor at Woodbury University in Burbank, California.

By Yael Hellman, Ed.D.