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Police Officer Standards and Training Boards
| Police hiring, training, and discipline |
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| • Police collective bargaining agreements (CBAs) • Ballotpedia CBA dashboard •Reform proposals •CBA areas of inquiry and disagreement •Arguments about police collective bargaining • Index of articles about criminal justice policy |
| Click here for more analysis of police hiring, training, and disciplinary requirements by state and city on Ballotpedia |
Police Officer Standards and Training (POST) boards (also known as Peace Officer Standards and Training) are state agencies responsible for establishing minimum educational requirements for police officers, maintaining professional standards, and providing oversight to the state police force. Every state has a POST board system or a comparable entity, though there is little uniformity across state POSTs and no federal standards.[1][2]
Background
Efforts to professionalize policing began in the 1950s, and the first training POST board was established in California in 1959. POST entities exist in all 50 states as of May 2024.[1]
Because state governments develop their own training standards through POST boards or their POST equivalent, there is little national uniformity for such; Federal Law Enforcement Training Centers receive certification from their host state's POST. However, the International Association of Directors of Law Enforcement Standards and Training (IADLEST) provides opportunities for state collaboration, auditing of state systems, guidance for minimum standards, and more. The resources provided by the IADLEST are not required. Officer discipline and decertification standards within the POST system vary among states as well.[1][3][4]
POST is a relevant term to a Ballotpedia analysis of police union collective bargaining agreements and related arrangements with police unions concerning hiring, training, and disciplinary requirements in the 50 states and top 100 cities by population.
See also
- Police hiring, training, and disciplinary requirements by state and city
- States and cities with police union agreements
Footnotes
- ↑ 1.0 1.1 1.2 National Conference of State Legislatures, "Police oversight and new legislation" accessed January 28th, 2022
- ↑ Monea, Nino. "A Tale of Two Committees: Comparing Police Officer Standard and Training (POST) Bodies." Forthcoming in the Law Journal for Social Justice (2024) Volume XVIII. (2023): 3-65.
- ↑ Job test prep, "Peace officer standards training" accessed January 28th, 2022
- ↑ Federal Law Enforcement Training Centers, "P.O.S.T. Certification", November 27, 2023.
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