POLCON 3
The Third Annual Conference of the Higher Education Forum for Learning and Development in Policing (POLCON 3)
4th and 5th September 2012
Conference Theme - 'Police Professionalisation - a HE Perspective'
The conference, being held at Liverpool John Moores University, falls at an extremely important and challenging time for both the police services and higher education. Within the reform agenda for policing, the debate over professionalisation is at centre stage while within higher education, changes in funding arrangements are opening up new opportunities that the police service can exploit. With a view to opening up debate about how higher education can best support police service human resource strategies and the professionalisation agenda we have secured an impressive list of key note speakers, the contributions of whom are influencing policy on a national scale. The conference will also allow researchers to showcase work that is being done either with or for the police service. The conference will be appropriate for academic managers, academics, researchers, police managers and others who are involved in the development, delivery and provision of police learning to debate this issue in the context of delivery in a higher education setting.
The focus of the conference is broad not only covering initial police training but also continuous professional development opportunities. In this way it will allow exploration of pre and post employment academic provision. It will also provide an opening to examine broader learning and development issues so that through research, develop professional practice or show how research can assist in the development of service provision eg. in examining the impact of changes in social policy.
While the focus is on this country there is an international element to the conference themes and papers that explore these wider trends will be encouraged. Another area of interest is for papers that explore the possibility that the inclusion of higher education can assist in broadening the recruitment base for the police service; not by dropping standards but by being able to help bring through quality applicants that have not necessarily followed a normal route through education.
Thus the conference provides opportunities for contributors from the policing and higher education communities to exchange views and information; it will be an opportunity to network, renew old acquaintances and forge new working relationships.
Please note the call for papers deadline has been extended to 29th July 2012
