The Police Communications Technician Passbook(R) prepares you for your test by allowing you to take practice exams in the subjects you need to study. It provides hundreds of questions and answers in the areas that will likely be covered on your upcoming exam, including but not limited to: understanding written information; communicating written information to another person; remembering new information; recognizing the existence of a problem; combining separate pieces of information to form a general conclusion; and more.
Master the Public Safety Dispatcher/911 Operator Exam provides everything you need to succeed on the exam, including two full-length practice tests, thorough review of every question type on the exam, proven test-taking strategies to help you score higher, and comprehensive information for beginning and advanced-level emergency personnel. Also, expert tips on how to best analyze job announcements and interviewing successfully are included to give you an edge over the competition.
"At a pace matching the flashing lights on a 911 console, Caroline Burau puts us in the hot seat and shows us the madness, the sadness, and the gallows humor of a profession that serves and protects in ways we never dream. And by telling us what goes on when the microphone is silent, she has taken the voice on the radio and given it heart." Michael Perry, author of Population 485 and Truck: A Love Story "A witty, gritty look at life on the receiving end of our cries for help." Reader's Digest (Editor's Choice) You answer a call from a fourteen-year-old boy asking for someone to arrest his mother, who is smoking crack in their bathroom. You talk with him until the cops arrive, making sure there are no weapons around and learning that his favorite subject in school is lunch. Five minutes later, you have to deal with someone complaining about his neighbor's clarinet practice. What is it like to be on the receiving end of desperate calls for help . . . every day? Caroline Burau, a former newspaper reporter and nursing student who couldn't stand the sight of blood, takes a job as an emergency dispatcher because she likes helping people. But on-the-job training at the comm center proves to be more than she bargained for. As she adjusts to a daily life of catastrophe and comedy, domestics and drunks, cops and robbers, junk food and sarcasm, lost cats and suicides, she discovers that crisis can become routine, that coworkers can be mean--that she must continue to care and, at times, learn how to let go. "The day may come when I have to dial 911. I hope to God that the person who answers is Caroline Burau or someone like her. Funny, honest, and elegantly simple, this book left me with a sense of grace and hope."--Alison McGhee, author of Shadow Baby, Rainlight, Was It Beautiful? and Falling Boy Caroline Burau is a 911 dispatch operator for the police and fire departments in White Bear Lake, Minnesota.
With one call, her daughter’s life is on the line. Laurie Ahmadi has worked as a 911 police dispatcher in her quiet Northern California town for almost two decades, but nothing in her nearly twenty years of experience could prepare her for the worst call of her career—her teenage daughter, Jojo, is on the other end of the line. She is drugged, disoriented, and in pain, and even though the whole police department springs into action, there is nothing Laurie can do to help. Jojo, who has been sexually assaulted, doesn’t remember how she ended up at the home of Kevin Leeds, a pro football player famous for his work with the Citizens Against Police Brutality movement, though she insists he would never hurt her. And she has no idea where her best friend, Harper, who was with her earlier in the evening, could be. As Jojo and Laurie begin digging into Harper’s private messages on social media to look for clues to her whereabouts, they uncover a conspiracy far bigger than they ever could have imagined. With Kevin’s freedom on the line and the chances of finding Harper unharmed slipping away, Laurie and Jojo begin to realize that they can’t trust anyone to find Harper except themselves, not even the police department they’ve long considered family . . . and time is running out.
From the author of the award-winning debut crime novel Good Neighbors-a white-knuckle thriller about the lengths a man will go to for his daughter. The phone rings. It's your daughter. She's been dead for four months. So begins East Texas police dispatcher Ian Hunt's fight to get his daughter back. The call is cut off by the man who snatched her from her bedroom seven years ago, and a basic description of the kidnapper is all Ian has to go on. What follows is a bullet-strewn cross-country chase from Texas to California along Interstate 10- a wild ride in a 1965 Mustang that passes through the outlaw territory of No Country for Old Men and is shot through with moments of macabre violence that call to mind the novels of Thomas Harris.
"Peterson's Master the Public Safety Dispatcher/911 Operator Exam, is the must-have guide for those seeking a career as an emergency dispatcher or 911 operator. This guide provides everything you need to succeed on the exam, including full-length practice tests, reviews of every question type on the exam, proven test-taking strategies to help you score higher, and comprehensive information for beginning and advanced-level emergency personnel."--Publisher's website
Nightmares, flashbacks, anger, concentration problems, emotional detachment, avoidance of people and places... These are some of the signs of PTSD. As many as one in three cops may suffer from PTSD, a condition that could lead to depression, suicidal thorughts, addictions, eating disorders, as well as job and family conflict. CopShock prepares police officers for the aftermath of horrific trauma, helps families understand PTSD's effect on their loved ones, tells true stories of officers-men and women-with PTSD, and offers over 200 support sources. In the second edition of this much praised book on police trauma survival, almost 50 percent of CopShock has been expanded, revised or updated with new material, including self-tests for PTSD, Panic Disorder, and Depression. Law enforcement officers throughout the United States, Canada and 8 other countries have used this book in their peer support programs, police academies, and post-trauma units. Therapists recommend it to their patients, and many law enforcement college programs include it in their curricula. Since the publication of CopShock's first edition in 1999, the book has been reviewed and praised around the world. The A&E Television Network produced a documentary based on CopShock that is shown today in police academies, colleges, and peer support groups. In this new second edition, and in the aftermath of 9/11, the war on terror, and the consequences from natural disasters like hurricane Katrina, CopShock will help many more police officers, firefighters, first responders, and war veterans cope with the damaging effects of PTSD.
Burnout is the state of emotional, mental, and physical exhaustion caused by excessive and prolonged stress. It happens when you feel overwhelmed and unable to meet constant demands. You begin to feel like you have no real control over your job...or your life. Sound familiar? This is an all-too-common experience for dispatchers, but it doesn't have to be that way. In this book, Adam Timm, former LAPD dispatcher, and I outline ways you can turn your life around faster than you ever thought possible. When you put the tools and techniques from Dispatcher Stress in place, you will: -Feel relief from tension, frustration, and insomnia -Be free to do the things you really want to do -Relax in the midst of the toughest challenges -Experience clarity and peace of mind again
