Military instruction and better coaching: that is the Civil Guard University Center | Training | Economy | EUROtoday

In only a few weeks, Miguel Oliver will end his research on the Officers Academy and the Civil Guard University Center, in Aranjuez (Madrid). He will depart with the job of lieutenant and two college levels: a level in Security Engineering and a grasp's diploma in Security Operational Management, each awarded by the Carlos III University; and he’ll do it after 5 years of coaching divided between the General Military Academy of Zaragoza and his personal college heart. Through the identical door as him, every of the 415 ensign cadets (337 males and 78 ladies) who’re at the moment finding out at a middle the place college training converges with navy instruction and coaching will find yourself leaving, with the identical job. and police of the Civil Guard.

The coaching offered there (built-in into the overall instructional system) has, logically, a standard denominator: citizen safety, in any of its facets. They are college levels, postgraduate research on the grasp's and doctoral stage and different programs by which they take part, across the axis represented by the Officers Academy and the University Center, an entire community of organizations that share the target of coaching future officers of the Civil Guard: the Carlos III University and the University of Zaragoza; the School of Legal Medicine; the Center for Legal Studies or the General Military Academy, amongst others.

A demanding and multidisciplinary coaching

The robotic portrait of the long run graduate is outlined from the start, and it’s exactly what determines “what type of knowledge, competencies, skills, aptitudes and attitudes we want the officers to have when they leave the academy… The integration of all this gives “forms the different study plans that the students must complete,” explains Francisco Fuentes, colonel director of the Civil Guard Officers Academy. An itinerary that, as mentioned, combines general military instruction with technical and university education (mostly of a police nature) that will prepare the cadets for their future professional tasks, and that includes:

• Technical-professional training: judicial police, citizen security, crime investigation, criminology, terrorism, organized crime, cybercrime…
• Scientific-technical training: computing, technologies applied to security, statistics, forensic sciences, telecommunications and digital skills, among others.
• Legal-humanistic training: law, fundamentals of economics, history, languages…

Knowledge that, Fuentes adds, is also mixed transversally with a whole series of competencies specifically designed for their responsibilities: specific professional training, “because here we cannot forget that we are training officers who are going to exercise command over groups of people”; and adaptation to social reality and the security environment, “since threats and risks to security are changing, and that is why adaptability is a fundamental competence.” Along with this, he factors out the mandatory dedication to the values ​​and rules of the Civil Guard and respect for the rights and freedoms acknowledged within the Constitution and the authorized system.

Among the postgraduate courses offered by the Officers Academy, it is worth noting, for example, university master's degrees such as Senior Management in International Security; that of Economic Crime and Anti-Corruption; or that of International Environmental Protection. The own degrees, for their part, cover a wide range of courses lasting between three and four months and 18 or 24 ECTS credits, in blended mode: cybercrime, hate crimes, environmental crimes, teaching digital skills… The methodology The academy is mixed, and although there are subjects where master classes predominate, in many others an eminently practical approach is used, with case studies, roleplays and technologies such as Virtual Reality and Artificial Intelligence.

Four access routes to the Officers Academy

The 415 cadets who are currently studying at the academy accessed through four different routes: direct access (for the civilian population), without a prior university degree and with it; and professional promotion (for members of the Civil Guard), equally divided between those who already had a degree and those who did not. This access will determine both the duration of the studies and the exit qualification, but not employment on the officer scale, since all of them will exit as lieutenants.

Oliver (the ensign cadet named at the beginning of this article), for example, used direct access without prior qualification. Like him, another 198 students whose access was determined by the grade obtained at the EVAU; a qualification, by the way, not inconsiderable, since the cut-off mark (which rises year after year) this year was 13.30, the highest of the different bodies of the Armed Forces. The average age of this group, the youngest, is 21.5 years.

A recently created access route (this academic year there are only 10 students) is the one that is aimed at the civilian population with certain previous university degrees, which vary depending on what is needed each year: in this case, training, two years of duration, will lead to a master's degree in Security Operational Management.

The desire for personal improvement is what pushed Fernando Venero, a sergeant of the Civil Guard from Cantabria, to the Officers Academy. Venero belongs to the second large group of the academy, which with 166 cadets, is formed by members of the Civil Guard without a previous university degree (and an average age of 40 years). To access this route you must be non-commissioned officers; After two years of study, they will obtain a degree in Public Security Management. But if, on the other hand, they already had a university degree (40 cadets), in two years they will be able to obtain a master's degree in Security Operational Management.

An academy with international activity

The Officers Academy represents the link point of the Civil Guard with CEPOL, the European College of Police. Every year, multiple activities are organized in which police officers from other countries participate, as well as the participation of its members in seminars held in the rest of the member countries. “In addition, every year we have students from other nations. This year, for example, there are two officers from Chile, one officer from Peru, one from Ecuador and another from Senegal, who are with our students for an entire academic year,” says Fuentes.

Regarding exchanges, the colonel director stands out among all those existing with the French Gendarmerie Officers School, through which students from the Aranjuez academy spend a week living with their officers, as well as later receiving them in its own Madrid facilities.

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