Considered one of the FBI's most important functions, training is a priority for our own personnel as well as for other federal, state, and local law enforcement officers.  In addition, there is a rapidly growing training program for law enforcement officers and executives of other countries, another vital component of the relationship the FBI has built with its counterparts in the United States and abroad.
 
 

         The largest of the Bureau's training efforts for non-FBI personnel is for local and state police who are trained at the field level under the Field Police Training program.  In the last five years, more than 598,000 law enforcement officers were trained nationwide in this program.

         In Kentucky, over the past three years Louisville FBI special agents have provided well over 2,000 state and local police officers and deputy sheriffs with training on matters as diverse as asset forfeiture, firearms instruction, hostage negotiation, crisis management, computer crimes, civil rights matters, crimes against children, terrorism, and media relations.  Thirty-one police officers received basic and advanced hazardous devices training at the FBI Redstone Arsenal in Alabama, while another 40 officers benefitted through advanced forensic science instruction at the FBI Academy.

         To better serve the law enforcement community through training that is both relevant and timely, the Louisville Division recently canvassed all municipal police departments and sheriffs' offices throughout the Commonwealth for feedback on their individual training needs  The results will help shape this and next year's training schedule throughout the state.
 
 

         One of the FBI's oldest and most prestigious law enforcement training programs is the National Academy at Quantico for foreign, state, and local officers.  Since 1935, nearly 35,000 police executives have completed the National Academy's ten-week management course.  Through this program, the FBI has developed excellent contacts with domestic and foreign officers and fostered relationships which have greatly increased cooperative investigations across the country and around the world.

         Nearly 40 command level Kentucky state and local police officers have graduated from the FBI National Academy in the last three years.  Today, many are chiefs of police and as National Academy Associates continue to further their education through FBI-sponsored retraining sessions.

         Annually, chief law enforcement executives throughout Kentucky are also selected to attend one or more FBI regional command colleges.  Selection to attend the National Executive Institute, the Law Enforcement Executive Development Seminar (LEEDS), the Tennessee LEEDS, or the Southeastern LEEDS is highly competitive and sought after by those law enforcement executives interested in continued career enhancement.
 
 

         One of the most important aspects of the FBI's work in building the most positive working relationships possible with other law enforcement agencies concerns its work abroad.  A high priority is placed on developing closer ties with law enforcement around the world.

         One precedent-setting development was the creation of the International Law Enforcement Academy (ILEA) in Budapest, Hungary, a combined effort of the Department of State and federal law enforcement agencies within the U.S. Government.

         The ILEA is an eight-week personal and professional development program, conducted for up to 50 students in each of five sessions per year.  The focus of the program is on leadership, personnel and financial management issues, human rights, ethics, the rule of law, management of the investigative process, and other contemporary law enforcement issues.

         Over the past three years, Louisville Division special agents have contributed to the ILEA mission by lecturing on a wide array of topics, including money laundering and asset forfeiture, major case management, white collar crimes and advanced financial crimes, and computer crimes.