Telos

Police officers stand at the center of deep divisions about who we are as a nation and what our priorities should be. And the existing tools they are provided to navigate this divide—such as mandatory workshops in things like diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) or implicit bias training—fall short of what they need to succeed professionally and personally.

Not only do nearly all registered voters (90%) mistrust an opposing political party’s intentions for the country, but almost half of voters in the last presidential election are so divided that they support splitting the country into two along partisan lines. 

Expecting officers to operate and live in such a divided context without providing them a holistic toolkit—including the perspectives, skills, and requisite drive—to better engage their communities and our growing polarization sets them, and ultimately us, up for failure.

Our solution seeks to bridge the gap in resourcing officers with training and tools that organically lead to personal and systemic transformation. We give police officers nationwide the opportunity to have week-long immersive experiences outside their communities, away from the baggage of politics and media that can interfere with learning. They hear the stories of people whose lived experiences give them a different perspective on law enforcement and help them build empathy for the communities at home where they serve, transforming their personal and professional interactions with community members. Along this journey, we provide a framework of principles and practices, reinforced by pre- and post-trip training that will better equip them to be active peacemakers. This model, once rolled out on a broad scale, will transform how local police understand and act toward their communities.

Our solution is based on a model of transformative immersive experience that Telos has adapted and refined since 2009, and has specifically adapted to examine issues of race in the US since 2017. We will be piloting our first experience for law enforcement in February 2022 with members from the Tempe, Arizona police department who are involved in and have influence with national law enforcement and minority leadership organizations—including the National Organization of Black Law Enforcement Executives (NOBLE), the International Association of Chiefs of Police (IACP), and the NAACP.