What came out of the Centre's Engagement Day?

On Thursday 15 June the Centre for Policing Research and Learning held an in-person Engagement Day at The Open University's campus in Milton Keynes with our partner forces. It was a very productive day, and it was great to have in-person discussions on a variety of topics related to policing. 

The day consisted of:

• A Membership Group meeting including a town square discussion on “Shifting priorities: Violence against women and girls”. 
• Two research seminars; one being on examining the impact of pregnancy, maternity leave and returning to work on women in policing; and the other being a CPD learning presentation, looking at reflections of the course on ‘Applied Leadership of Data and Technology for Innovation and Wellbeing’.
• Six workshops presented by a selection of Centre academics and police partners. The topics were:"Building trust, confidence and community engagement in policing";"Uncomfortable knowledge and police trustworthiness";"Increasing the resilience of young people: The Boost Prevention Programme in Gloucestershire";"Bridging the Research-Practice Gap in Policing ";"Building on the insights from the family wellbeing project"; and "Education needs of police forces – current OU offers and new ideas".
• The Steven Chase Memorial Lecture, titled “Unusually challenging times”: reflections on why we are here, and how the police service moves forward”, was delivered by Martin Hewitt, most recently in the national policing role of Chair of the National Police Chiefs' Council (NPCC) and now a Visiting Fellow in CPRL. This inagural lecture was in honour of Dr Steven Chase OBE, who was the first and former chair of CPRL and embodied the idea of ‘research into practice and practice into research’ which has underpinned CPRL’s work in research, learning and knowledge into practice. Martin talks about how and why the service is in ‘unusually challenging times’, some broader contextual factors, and proposed actions. The high-profile discussants on these challenges were Andy Cooke (His Majesty’s Chief Inspector of Constabulary and Fire and Rescue Services) and Andy Marsh (Chief Constable and Chief Executive of the College of Policing).
• The OU’s Vice-Chancellor, Professor Tim Blackman, also presented the Steven Chase Memorial Award to Dr Paul Walley for his research work with Gloucestershire Constabulary.

All of the resources from the day, including presentation slides and a video of the lecture are available on our members area.

Hear what our own Vice-Chair, Phil Davies, thought of the day…

I was delighted to have been invited to co-chair proceedings of our CPRL Engagement Day in the absence of our very capable Chair Nick Caveney. There is often no substitute for the coming together of colleagues and partners in a shared spaced beyond the virtual setting to progress our agenda as a collective and to welcome new attendees. 

I found the day to be full of energy and ideas, with space for workshop dialogue and networking. The inaugural Steven Chase memorial lecture provided a heavyweight input from the outgoing former NPCC Chair Martin Hewitt, and discussants Andy Cooke (HMICFRS) and Andy Marsh (College of Policing). It is infrequent such a billing is seen at police conferences, and it lived up to expectation.
CPRL is now 26 forces strong with a catalogue of academic projects that are already providing a catalyst for ‘research into practice’ and there is every confidence we will continue to grow. I look forward to our next event and the development of some exciting new projects discussed on the day.