MILO-based Training Supports Department of Justice COPS Grant-based Initiatives
Published
The Department of Justice’s Office of Community Oriented Policing Services (COPS Office) announced in October that the Justice Department had awarded “over $33 million in grants to advance community policing efforts across the country.” These funds will be used “to support promising practices through the development and testing of innovative strategies,” to build “knowledge about effective practices and outcomes,” and to support “new, creative approaches to preventing crime and promoting safe communities.”
“Keeping communities safe requires building relationships and increasing trust between law enforcement and those they serve,” said Attorney General Merrick B. Garland in the press release. “The wide range of programs these funds will support – from de-escalation training and anti-bias efforts to technical assistance and accreditation programs – are critical to achieving our public safety goals.”
This grant funding will support initiatives in the following areas:
- Crisis Intervention Teams
- Tolerance, Diversity, and Anti-Bias Training
- De-escalation Training
- COPS Microgrants
- Accreditation
MILO has long been at the forefront of developing and testing innovative strategies, resulting in promising practices and safer communities. Offering virtual, live, and cognitive divisions backed by decades of experience, MILO solutions can deliver quality programming and simulation-based training to meet the training-specific grant-funded initiatives supported by the Department of Justice COPS Office.
Crisis Intervention Teams
MILO Simulation-based mental health awareness training solutions far outperform conventional role-play with colleagues. MILO CIT training helps officers develop a therapeutic and recovery approach to volatile, rapidly evolving mental health crisis interventions and practice how to safely de-escalate mental health situations.
Tolerance, Diversity, and Anti-Bias Training
MILO is the exclusive provider of Counter Bias Training Simulation (CBTSim™), the award-winning solution created from over a decade of DOJ grant-funded research. With a combination of evidence-based curriculum and the immersive power of MILO technology, officers are presented with a diverse range of scenarios in which they are required to interact, de-escalate, make split-second decisions, then identify why they made those decisions. The goal of CBTSim is for officers to treat citizens fairly and free of bias, and to make any use-of-force decisions based on threat cues alone, and not on citizen characteristics like demographics or socio-economic status.
De-escalation Training
MILO includes a standard library of more than 1000 scenarios, ranging from routine traffic stops to complex mental-health crises and domestic situations, that allows trainees to remain in conversations and maintain calm in intense situations. These role-playing simulation scenarios are emotionally immersive, with branching decision trees, giving officers the opportunity to exercise every facet of their training—from fine-tuning their presence, tone of voice, and de-escalation strategies to using force options, when necessary according to the law. Throughout every scenario, the instructor can make adjustments to hone both individual and interdependent aspects of their trainees’ judgment, situational awareness, and de-escalation skills.
MILO can help your agency build knowledge about effective practices and outcomes and support new, creative approaches to preventing crime and promoting safe communities. Most importantly, MILO can help your officers hone their interpersonal skills to build relationships and increase trust between law enforcement and those they serve.