Lasd Academy

[Aten1998]

I’m sure this question has been asked a million and a half times, but I’m looking for some advice prior to starting the academy with LASD. I was recently offered a Job with LAPD, but turned down the offer with hopes of working for LASD who has a ton of assignments that interest me more. My BI said I should be looking at a June or July academy and I want to be as prepared as possible.

My question is more regarding the academic portion throughout the academy, and where I can try to prepare for it before it starts. My wife is pregnant and due in July which is mostly what concerns me when it comes to having time to study and prepare for the academic portion such as tests. I plan to stay within 10-15 minutes of the academy to give myself the most time to study, and try to bond with my baby throughout the duration.

I plan to continue to study and memorize things such as the Mission statement, Core Values, Phonetic alphabet, and codes prior to my start date, but I wanted to see how many hours a day of studying I would possibly be looking at to pass my tests and succeed. Any information or advice is greatly appreciated, and hopefully I’ll be in a class soon! Thank you.

[Iowa #1603]

https://forum.officer.com/forum/local-discussion-groups/u-s-states/california/172675-l-a-s-d-dst-status

https://forum.officer.com/forum/local-discussion-groups/u-s-states/california/7117880-lasd-academy

[Aidokea]

I’m sure this question has been asked a million and a half times, but I’m looking for some advice prior to starting the academy with LASD. I was recently offered a Job with LAPD, but turned down the offer with hopes of working for LASD who has a ton of assignments that interest me more. My BI said I should be looking at a June or July academy and I want to be as prepared as possible.

My question is more regarding the academic portion throughout the academy, and where I can try to prepare for it before it starts. My wife is pregnant and due in July which is mostly what concerns me when it comes to having time to study and prepare for the academic portion such as tests. I plan to stay within 10-15 minutes of the academy to give myself the most time to study, and try to bond with my baby throughout the duration.

I plan to continue to study and memorize things such as the Mission statement, Core Values, Phonetic alphabet, and codes prior to my start date, but I wanted to see how many hours a day of studying I would possibly be looking at to pass my tests and succeed. Any information or advice is greatly appreciated, and hopefully I’ll be in a class soon! Thank you.

That's all good stuff to study. So is geography.

The most tedious part of memorizing stuff for me, was all the city/county/state statutes.

You need to not only memorize the most important parts of many of those statutes verbatim, but you also need to know the individual elements of those offenses, and at some point you'll start to be asked to apply those statutes to hypothetical and real fact patterns.

It's not possible to memorize hundreds and hundreds of pages of statutes, so it helps to know what to study and what to skip. Some of it is going to be VERY important to know, and some of it will NEVER be brought up. If you know someone within the LASD that can tell you what stuff to study and what to skip, that can be helpful. If you have no LASD contacts, any California cop should be able to point you in the right direction.

For example, you won't need to know that it's illegal to put a squirrel down your pants for the purpose of betting, but you're going to need to know the typical disorderly conduct and non-driving alcohol offenses upside down, inside out, and backwards.

A lot of 3-5 year rookie cops still have their stuff from academy, like state law books with notes and highlighting, and they may be willing to loan or give them to you, because new law books come out every year, usually with only minor changes.

3x5 recipe cards with that stuff on it, can be helpful study aids- I spent many nights during academy with my wife quizzing me using home made flash cards like that.

[Aidokea]

Another major brain drain, is DUI investigations.

A LOT of recruits REALLY struggle with it during academy and FTO. And then they just give up after they go solo, which is weak and irresponsible. If you let a DUI offender go because you suck, and the offender kills someone, that blood is on your hands, and there could be life-altering consequences for you.

I'm guessing LASD has dedicated DUI guys, but you never know when one might not be available. I've done DUIs at 9 in the morning. I don't know the LASD specifically, but I would assume that you'll need to be able to demonstrate proficiency in DUI investigations to pass FTO for liability reasons, so they'll be able to say you were trained properly if anything ever goes wrong.

NHTSA DUI training is standardized, so any cop nationwide should be able to mentor you. You probably won't be able to find an officer willing to give up their NHTSA DUI manual, as they tend to be guarded pretty closely. You may be able to find one online.

At first glance, it may look like a large volume of confusing stuff to learn, but the way I learned it, was to break it down into sections, because learning individual sections was easier than trying to just power through the whole thing. For example, there are three parts to a DUI investigation: Vehicle In Motion, Personal Contact, and Pre-Arrest Screening.

And the single biggest issue for most recruits, is learning HGN (Horizontal Gaze Nystagmus). It is NOT voodoo. It's not a game or a routine physical performance that you do. Once you "get it", no drunk will ever be able to fool you. You'll know EXACTLY what you're looking at. "The eyes never lie."

I recommend abstaining from alcohol during academy and FTO, but I will tell you that you can see HGN in other drunk people, even if YOU'RE drunk. During my last academy, we had "study groups" to practice the HGN test on each other while drinking.

[NolaT]

Flash cards, with the info broken down into small, short, sentences. There isn’t ANY secret or short cut, you MUST review the cards often,……

Good luck and keep us updated!

[Aidokea]

Every academy can be different, but PT can have a significant impact on your academics, if you are struggling in PT.

Again, I don't know the LASD, but historically, running has been a big part of PT. Knowing diet, hydration, and sports medicine as it relates to running, can be very important. Running is used as a "gut check" to see who really wants to be there.

To that end, you cannot graduate academy without the cooperation of your classmates, and it's important to know that it is customary in law enforcement academies, to punish the entire class with painful abdominal PT exercises to the point of failure and well beyond, while waiting for the slowest runner to catch up. If you're slow, your classmates will be looking for an opportunity to get rid of you.

So find out what the minimum PT standards are to get hired, what the PT standards are to graduate, and what is actually expected beyond that. For example, my last academy had a standard of roughly 16 minutes for the 1.5 mile run. I graduated with a 9:28, and there were only two graduates slower than me. Anyone expecting to graduate with a 14 minute 1.5 mile run, probably isn't going to graduate.

[Aidokea]

I cannot imagine starting academy with a newborn.

Again, I don't know the LASD and every academy is different, but I could not have graduated from my last academy without a LOT of help from my wife.

She quit her job to support me full time during academy. Every night when I got home, she would bring me ice packs and ace bandages for my knees. I would elevate my knees on the sofa, and she would bring me my dinner, water, then Ibuprofen and joint supplements, then my laptop and all my study materials, so I could put in some hours on my homework. She always had the house clean, quiet, and in order, so that I could get the maximum amount of sleep.

Then comes FTO, and it gets MUCH worse, because now you may be sleeping during the day with blackout shades and an air conditioner, working nights, and occasionally going without sleep entirely, due to court.

And just when you thought it couldn't get any worse, you'll go solo and enter the REAL WORLD, when supervisors are constantly asking (and sometimes ordering) you to work overtime hours beyond comprehension. I've worked more than 20 hours straight. I've worked COUNTLESS 17-hour doubles, virtually all of them on no notice. I've been called in the middle of the night while I was sleeping and ordered to come to work, even on my days off. I routinely worked 17-hour doubles back to back, on no sleep. MANY times I worked THREE 17-hour doubles back to back, on as little as one hour of sleep per day. I've worked for weeks on end, with no days off. I averaged about 65 hours a week for the about the last 15 years of my career. You'll go through coffee, Monsters, and Red Bulls, like they were water. You'll type into the computer until you can't read the screen because you have double vision. And during the 3-5 year rookie phase, rookies are expected to step up and volunteer to take those extra shifts, to give the older guys a break.

So good luck with that...

[Aidokea]

Lol. I just re-read your comment about bonding with your baby.

You will work at night when your family is sleeping, and you'll sleep during the day when they're up. You'll work pretty much all weekends and holidays. You'll miss virtually all family gatherings. Your family will probably go on vacations without you. I wasn't able to attend my own mother's funeral.

Your child will grow up seeing PICTURES of you. Your child will learn to be SILENT during the day, so that you can sleep. Your child will be the age you are now, when you retire and can finally spend time with them. And if your child becomes a cop, you may never see them.

[Aidokea]