Behind the Badge: My Journey Through Duke’s Citizens Police Academy
A six-week immersive experience reveals challenges, camaraderie and commitment of Duke University Police Department officers

As I stood in the darkening parking lot off Anderson Street while glaring blue police car lights pierced my eyes, Duke Police Sgt. Andrew Pendley gave my newfound best friends in Duke Citizens Police Academy Squad A one final pep talk.
We were about to attempt a (simulated) felony traffic stop in Week 2 of our six-week training offered to Duke staff and faculty twice annually by the Duke University Police Department.
“Just so you guys know,” Pendley told us, “you’re going to fail. That’s the point.”
Ahem. I like to think he did not know whom he was talking to.
Nancy Wines, a Program Coordinator at The Graduate School has a quick wit and commanding presence.
Lisa Wioskowski, Associate Director of Financial Aid at the Duke School of Medicine, is speedy with a comeback and a steadying leader. And Suzie Zeunges, a Program Manager for Patient Safety and Clinical Quality, has been working at Duke for nearly 30 years and seems to know a little bit about everything everywhere.
Everyone knew someone in law enforcement or had worked with police before – and an interest in understanding how the profession works.
And then there was me, a senior writer for Working@Duke who doesn’t regularly watch “CSI: Crime Scene Investigation,” has no family members or friends who are police officers and has never received so much as a speeding ticket (which I’m sure I just jinxed now). My greatest knowledge of the inner-workings of the police department comes from one week spent covering cops when I interned at the Lexington Herald-Leader more than 20 years ago.
Which is to say that I would be relying on my fellow Squad A members to get this traffic stop right.
Which they did.
As two Duke Citizens Police Academy graduates acted out roles as potentially violent vehicle occupants for our felony suspects, Nancy barked out commands, Lisa provided steady backup and Suzie was knowledgeable reassurance. I mostly stood behind everyone and tried to stay out of the way.
Somehow it all worked, and we managed to handcuff the two “unruly” vehicle occupants after directing them out of the car. Pendley turned to us and nodded.
“That might have been one of the best traffic stops I’ve ever seen here,” he said, as we all whooped in agreement.


But that doesn’t mean that my Squad A was ready then or at any time over the course of the six weeks for the real North Carolina basic law enforcement training (BLET) to become a certified law enforcement officer.
“The point of this is just to make you aware of all the things that could go wrong,” Pendley explained of his initial skepticism. “Our whole goal as police officers every day is to make sure we go home again.”



A close-knit family
It’s safe to say we all know that police officers have a difficult job. But it’s also true that a slight majority – 51% – of Americans expressed confidence in the police as an institution in 2024 according to Gallup – a marked increase from a 43% approval rating in 2023.
I came to the Duke Citizens Police Academy to learn what Duke’s Police officers do daily and to try to understand more about their most difficult challenges. The free evening academy for staff and faculty at the University and Health System has an open registration throughout the year and typically reaches capacity of 16 to 20 students per class. The next class begins in early March.
I was part of the 20th graduating class. The program has become so popular that there is an alumni academy offered to graduates, and the alumni class graduated its 10th class in Fall 2024.
At the start of our class, Daryl Mount, a Crime Prevention Specialist and Duke Citizens Police Academy Director, said we would learn how to complete a felony traffic stop, try to solve a mock crime, understand domestic violence investigations, learn about firearms and use of force and immerse ourselves in a mock active-shooter situation.
“One of the reasons we do this is about building relationships,” Duke Police Chief John Dailey told us in his welcome address. “Because all that stuff is interesting, it's all stuff that they have to do. But at the end of the day, it’s about people. That’s ‘Job 1’ – helping people. And that's what's really cool about this and that's hopefully what you will take away – is their concern and their dedication to service.”
And Mount let us in on another little secret in that first class, too.
“Our goal is to try to show you family,” he said. “It’s to try to show that we are a close-knit family, and we're also going to bring you all into that family.”


Family support
I felt that sense of family from the first class.
Mount was the paternal guidance who led classes and confessed some of his most difficult real-life policing experiences, several coming from heartbreaking domestic violence investigations. Assistant Chief Sara-Jane Raines, a Duke alumna, was the sage elder who has worked in the police department since the early 1990s, shared endless stories and knowledge. Officer Aaron Pruka was like our friendly older brother with a wealth of wisdom who occasionally dropped nuggets of profound insight.
“If you’re in search of perfection, you’re not going to find it,” Pruka told us before my Squad A headed into the simulated active shooter scenario.
My Squad A became my family, too, as Nancy, Lisa, Suzie and I traded barbs and moments of astonishment each time we learned something new. We all connected from the start when I somehow guessed Nancy’s dancing pantomime during an ice-breaker round of charades was for “Bad Boys,” and the four of us immediately became determined to win every academy challenge while laughing and smiling throughout.
“I’ve never met a stranger,” Nancy explained soon after we met, and we all bonded quickly.
And although I had a general concept of the difficulty, I also learned just how demanding the job of policing is, particularly at a university and health system where officers must balance educating young students with keeping the public safe at a major hospital.
Among my toughest lessons: We went through a golf cart obstacle course while wearing “beer goggles” that simulated what it felt like to drive while impaired, and I learned that I accidentally made it 10 times more difficult by forgetting to release the parking brake.
When we tried to solve a criminal investigation, I learned that most of us are a little too into conspiracy theories that somehow obscure the obvious facts in front of us.
And I failed miserably in a simulated domestic violence scenario by allowing one actor I thought I had calmed down through conversation to come back into the room where she started throwing paper and aluminum cans at her partner. If that had been a real-life situation, it would have ended tragically.
“Remember, we spend years training for this,” Pruka reminded us. “You just get a couple hours.”
Getting a taste of what it’s like allowed me to see a slice of how difficult the law enforcement profession is and why the officers at the Duke University Police Department are as close as family.


At our graduation ceremony – after my Squad A earned the “Top Squad” award for the best consistent performances throughout the six weeks – Pendley handed me a certificate of completion for the academy.
“You didn’t fail,” he said, grinning.
I knew he had faith in me all along.
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