This fall ASU students will be able to translate 911 calls and run license plates as volunteers for the ASU police department in hopes of making the four University campuses safer.
An adapted form of the Volunteers in Police Service program, or VIPS, will be instituted for the first time at ASU at the start of the fall 2008 semester.
The VIPS program began six years ago and has extended to all 50 states with a total of 1732 programs. The first VIPS program in Arizona was held in Mesa, where volunteers were trained in numerous fields, including running license plates, watching for speeders and responding to speeding complaints.
ASU Assistant Chief of Police Jay Spradling — a 25–year veteran of the force — will be heading up the program at ASU and said he hopes to train and enroll various volunteers to better serve the University campus.
The success of the nationwide VIPS program, Spradling said, is due to volunteers being matched up to job titles that suit their work goals.
“We have created a job description booklet from shredding paper to being able to maintain military clearance,” Spradling said. “No area of the police force is off limits.”
Volunteers for the ASU program must be at least 18 to enroll, be drug free, and have a desire to gain hands-on experience with ASU police, Spradling said.
The number one crime at ASU’s Tempe campus is bicycle theft, so by creating this program Spradling hopes to decrease the number of incidences this year.
Nancy Kolb has been managing the program on a national level for the last five years by maintaining the Web site, gathering volunteers and providing the necessary training for each police department.
“We have given ASU Tempe police department numerous resources, and prepared them on how to make a volunteer program a success,” Kolb said.
Sheila Byrne, Citywide volunteer management chairwoman, said she believes individuals can have an impact on their community through volunteer work.
The presence of a volunteer in uniform is enough to slow down a speeder or warn off an intoxicated driver before he or she takes the wheel, Byrne said.
The new program will be able to go beyond what the ASU police department’s budget could ever acquire, she said, and serve as a resource to prevent crime on all four campuses.
“Individuals who volunteer in the police service program can help prevent a serious crime or accident before it occurs,” Byrne said.
Reach the reporter at: ashainke@asu.edu.
