Content of original post: your instructor will be looking for you to articulate

Content of original post: your instructor will be looking for you to articulate into at least one well stated post response, a demonstration that you understand the weekly material/subject and possess a command of that material/subject. In addition, the expectation is that you display critical thinking skills by bringing into the discussion at least three relevant resources and that your post(s) will promote significant further thought on the topic.
Discussion posts should reference a minimum of three scholarly reference sources. Wikipedia and similar sites are not scholarly reference sources.
All of your posted content should demonstrate that you understand and possess a command of the course material.
Remember, according to the discussion rubric, the use of two resources in an original post will receive an average grade. Use of additional resources is necessary to achieve a higher grade.
If you use ideas from others, you may summarize them, paraphrase them, or quote them. Quotes require quotation marks and all three require appropriate attribution.
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Needs to be at least 450 words and APA format. Instructor guidance listed above.
Discussion post:
Considering what you’ve learned from our readings this week and what you’ve experienced in the public safety field, discuss the following:
What factors are most important to an individual considering entering a public safety discipline and why?
As an administrator, what factors are most important to you concerning the prospective employees and why?
Considering our reading about individuals being mentally fit for a job in public safety, what do you imagine it is that a public safety organization should be doing to ensure that they are hiring only those individuals who are mentally fit for the job. Given the often-contentious relationship between employees and Human Resources, how do you imagine efforts to weed out mentally unfit candidates would be received by current employees?
What efforts would you argue go too far in that they are potentially discriminatory?
Readings
PDF – Fit for public safety: Informing attitudes and practices tied to the hiring of public safety personnel
This is a nineteen-page 2020 report from the Journal of Workplace Behavioral Health. The article discusses mental readiness of individuals interested in becoming public safety professionals. Specifically, the authors look at mental characteristics that are most necessary to have for an individual interested in public safety. The article also looks at mental characteristics that should be considered to make an individual unfit for public safety occupations. Much of the information presented is from the perspective of public safety professionals who were surveyed. The authors recount the opinions of the those surveyed and either confirm or refute their assertions based on data gathered for the study.
Culture Clash
In this short article published in the National Fire Protection Association Journal in 2020, Angelo Verzoni summarizes the National Volunteer Fire Council’s Volunteer Retention Research Report. The recruitment and retention of volunteers is, as the author states, critically important to public safety in the United States as two thirds of firefighters are volunteers. The complete report is not required reading but is available PDF – here.
4 reasons you shouldn’t become a firefighter
Pursuing a firefighting career with misguided motives will make for an unhappy career choice. This short 2020 article by Steve Prziborowski on the Fire Chief site is interest and relates not only to recruitment and retention but also to the current literature suggesting detrimental effects of unrealistic expectations on mental health in the public safety field. This article is a valuable read for non-firefighters as well in that it provides information that’s relatable to other disciplines and also provides non-firefighters with a closer look at that public safety discipline.
Faceless heroes: A content analysis of determinants for the recruitment, career development & retention of Emergency Medical Dispatchers in the United States of America
The seven-page study from 2021 looks at recent trends in Emergency Medical Dispatcher retention and recruitment. The study adds to our understanding of retention in public safety in general, compliments our understanding of the history of EMS and emergency dispatch, and introduces us to information about mental health issues in public safety—our next topic of discussion. Students may find that the discussions concerning the study’s methodology, analysis and findings add little to their understanding and so decide to only skim those sections.
PDF – Law Enforcement recruitment and retention: Bests practices from the field
This is an eight-page chapter of the 2019 Justice Department’s Law Enforcement Best Practices: Lessons Learned from the Field. This section provides thirteen best practice for recruiting law enforcement personnel. As with many other discipline-specific public safety publications, many of the principles in this document are transferable to other public safety disciplines.
Supplemental reading: Not required reading
Contributions of Affective Temperament Traits to Professional Choice: Evidence from the Study of Firefighters, Musicians, Athletes, Bank Managers, Nurses and Paramedics
This study in an interesting look at temperaments and their impact on individual choices of career paths. While the explanation of the study can be relatively complicated at places, students who choose to wade through it will likely find it interesting and the information relatable to their public safety discipline.