Hello, all. Made my account a few years ago and then kind of forgot about it. I have been a patrol officer for a smaller city in WA state for about five years. I have been a pistol instructor for about two, patrol rifle instructor for one, and last year I was put entirely in charge of our firearms training program with one other new instructor who is even less experienced. I am also in charge of taser training, and have been the de facto trainer for medical scenarios, building searches, etc in the last year. We are about 20 sworn.
I have also been an operator on our regional Tactical Response Team since 2020, and was put in the sniper role recently.
Mostly I am here looking for ways to improve the firearms training program for my dept. It is a game of trying to do more with less. I have only been granted two in service range half days this year... we did pistol & rifle quals in January and we will be doing less lethal shotgun quals and a night range in April.
Our training has been very check the box for years. I have been introducing short dry fire sessions and completely updated our patrol rifle in service training last year by yanking out the old powerpoint and replacing it with mostly hands on essential skills dry fire practice followed by two hours at the range for zero confirmation, the annual qual, vehicle bailout drills and then a simple drill involving emergency reloads from the active shooter bag each officer was issued a few years ago. Most had never bothered to practice reloads from the bag before that point.
So I will be looking for tips from other trainers on how to make training fun, fit and functional for patrol officers who mostly do not bother to train on their own. Apparently the notion that they might actually be in a gunfight someday is an insufficient motivator for most officers, as everyone who has taught line level LE knows. Still, it is hard to complain, as I was granted my position as instructor because I was actually interested and willing, despite being low in seniority.
