Evaluation of Ongoing Crisis Intervention Team (CIT) Training for Law Enforcement Using the ECHO Model

Abstract

Crisis Intervention Team (CIT) training aims to improve law enforcement officers’ (LEOs) ability to safely intervene in calls for service involving individuals with mental illness, as well as to increase LEOs’ ability to link these individuals to mental health services and divert them from the criminal justice system. However, most CIT training is delivered as a stand-alone class, and continuing education in CIT principles and best practices is limited. To address this problem, the Albuquerque Police Department, in partnership with the Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences at the University of New Mexico, developed CIT ECHO to provide continuing education in CIT best practices. The authors evaluated 113 weekly CIT ECHO sessions targeting LEOs in New Mexico, offered between 2017 and 2020. LEOs electronically completed a post-session survey after each didactic; additionally, a targeted follow-up survey was distributed to LEOs participating in at least three sessions. Surveys measured impact of CIT ECHO on knowledge, self-efficacy, and attitudes towards individuals with mental illness involved in the criminal justice system. After participating in CIT ECHO, LEOs reported increases in knowledge of didactic content and that they felt comfortable applying didactic content on the job. LEOs also evidenced positive attitudinal shifts towards individuals with mental illness and criminal justice involvement. Continuing education in CIT best practices appears to increase LEOs’ knowledge base and comfort in working with individuals with mental illness and criminal justice involvement, as well as results in positive attitudinal shifts towards this population.

In Search of a Modus Operandi for Evaluation: Developing a Mixed-Methods Approach for Crisis Team Exercises

“…Although survey and interview instruments are generally popular methods in order to capture individual perceptions as well as personal assessments of performance, success, etc., in addition to observations, they are less frequently found in the exercise evaluation literature. Some mention (quantitative or standardized) survey instruments and/or interviews which could be used before and or after an exercise-though surveys seem to account for a larger share than interviews (Crisanti et al 2022;Fiedrich et al 2012;Gißler 2020;Helfgott et al 2021;Sørensen et al 2020;Son et al 2022;Thielsch and Hadzihalilovic 2020;Unger 2010). Equally rare are elaborated mixed-methods-designs that (loosely) combine, but triangulate more than two different methods and or data (sources) (Bruns et al 2022;Drews et al 2019;Gißler 2020;Reuter and Pipek 2009;Unger 2010).…”