FRESNO, Calif. (KFSN) — It’s not uncommon for law enforcement agencies to work together on a call for service.<\/p>\n
A recent call the Fresno County Sheriff’s Office, Madera County Sheriff’s Office and California Highway Patrol responded to wasn’t for help in a neighborhood; it was for help in a classroom.<\/p>\n
“This idea started about a year ago when we attended a national conference, and we learned about the shortage of emergency dispatchers across the nation,” Fresno County Superintendent of Schools ROP\/CTE Content Coordinator Mike McColm said.<\/p>\n
McColm says they came up with a concept for a mobile, hands-on dispatch center.<\/p>\n
It will spend two weeks at 10 different high schools to serve students who are in the criminal justice pathway.<\/p>\n
The goal is to give students a realistic idea of what it takes to become an emergency dispatcher.<\/p>\n
“So this trailer is built to mimic an actual dispatch center with lighting and just the way it’s laid out,” McColm said.<\/p>\n
The classroom-on-wheels has 10 consoles for students and a teaching center at the front.<\/p>\n
The course curriculum was created in part by dispatchers themselves.<\/p>\n
“Each agency had specific lesson plans that we came up with and developed for the youth, and I think it’ll go a long way. Specifically in mind was professionalism and ethics,” CHP Public Safety Dispatch Supervisor II Joe Artellan said.<\/p>\n
The computer systems use artificial intelligence, so students can practice with calls based on real-life scenarios.<\/p>\n
“We can create it to where the caller is excited, and they’re yelling. You can have background noises, so if it’s like shots, it’s like shots fired, then you’ll hear the gunshots in the background,” Fresno County Sheriff’s Office Communications Dispatch Supervisor Veronica Cervantes said.<\/p>\n
Students who complete the course will be endorsed by California POST, or “Peace Officers Standard and Training.”<\/p>\n
Fresno City College’s Dispatch Academy Lead Instructor, Theresa Burgamy, says what students learn in the mobile classroom will better prepare them to start the academy and earn their certifications.<\/p>\n
“We could equip them with the tools they need to be dispatchers. They already have that free knowledge of what happens, instead of coming in off the streets where they have absolutely no idea what a dispatcher does,” Burgamy said.<\/p>\n
Madera County Sheriff Tyson Pogue says dispatchers are one of the most difficult positions to fill in an agency.<\/p>\n
He believes this new center will lead to strong future candidates.<\/p>\n
“So long term, we’re hoping to find those individuals out there that can really bring calm to the chaos when someone’s calling 911, with the life and death emergency happening, we can find that calm voice on the other end that can coordinate resources and really bring to the table what needs to happen to really save that situation,” Sheriff Pogue said.<\/p>\n
The trailer will be formally unveiled on Monday, December 15, in downtown Fresno.<\/p>\n
In addition to the 10 schools the mobile classroom will visit, it will also make stops at other schools in Fresno, Madera and Mariposa counties.<\/p>\n
The goal is to increase interest in the criminal justice pathway and raise awareness about the need for more emergency dispatchers.<\/p>\n
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