TRAINING SEMINARS
INTERESTED IN HOSTING TRAINING?
Your agency will get two free seats if you host one of our training seminars at your agency, provide a suitable training location and assist with getting the word out to other area agencies. Seminars can be combined for a multi-day and topic training event at a discount. All seminars require a minimum of 45 days advanced scheduling.
​
Principis Group develops specialized training courses to meet client needs!
REQUEST TRAINING
Selected Past Training
CURRENT TRAINING OFFERED BY PRINCIPIS GROUP
-
Frederick, Colorado
-
Olathe, Kansas
-
Ft. Bragg, California
-
Titusville, Florida
-
Marina, California
-
Walnut Creek, California
-
Hurst, Texas
-
Boerne, Texas
-
Los Angeles, California
-
UC Santa Cruz, California
-
Santa Clara, California
-
Fort Collins, Colorado
-
Ventura, California
-
Lake County, Illinois
-
San Luis Obispo, California
-
Cañon City, Colorado
-
Escambia County, Florida
Click on links below for course description
BWC Policy Development, Improvement and Management
BWC Program Compliance and Auditing
BWC Supervisor Review Programs
Critical Issues in BWC Programs
​
Selected Public Access Webinars
-
CSAC Excess Insurance Authority Risk Management Webinar: Public Agency Management of Body-Worn Cameras, Part 1, 11/5/2015 & Part 2, 11/19/2015
-
BJA TTA Webinar Series: Impact of Body-Worn Cameras on Use of Force Policies, 7/26/16
-
BJA TTA Webinar Series: BWC Policy Compliance, 12/19/2016
-
BJA TTA Webinar Series: A Spotlight on BWCs and Training, 6/28/2017
-
BJA TTA Webinar Series: Digital Evidence Integration, 1/23/2019
-
BJA TTA Podcast Series: BWC Compliance & Auditing, 3/2020
-
BJA TTA National Meeting: Understanding the Benefits of Compliance Checks & Audits, 6/2021
-
Using BWC Data to Improve Your Agency. Turleo, 1/2022
-
Stop FOIA Requests for BWC Footage from Rocking Your Boat. Granicus, 8/2022
BWC Policy Development, Improvement and Management
Who should attend: BWC program administrators and staff
Length: 1 or 2 Day Options
Overview:
Developing and maintaining a comprehensive, effective, and executable policy is the single most important aspect of a body-worn camera program. Policy must be collaboratively drafted, staffed, and completed before deploying cameras and then maintained on a routine basis. Writing good policy requires balancing national guidelines with the unique requirements of an agency’s operating environment. It’s not enough to know what items should be included in policy; how those items are articulated is equally as important. Policy must be specific and clear. Officers should never have to wonder if they are in compliance with policy. Like many other key police policies, body-worn camera policy will constantly evolve. Agencies must constantly scan for emerging best practices and court rulings and be prepared to integrate them where applicable. This seminar is designed to examine all facets of best practice policy development and continual management.
Topics include:
-
Policy development
-
Internal and external policy collaboration efforts
-
Adapting national guidelines to your agency
-
Policy construction
-
Critical policy areas
-
Impact of state laws on body-worn camera policy
-
Policy monitoring
Topics for 2 Day Seminar include (all topics above plus):
-
Policy failure case studies
-
Current policy evaluation discussion for attending agencies
-
Policy revisions using Principis Group policy template
-
BWC policy and the public
-
Importance of archiving and documenting policy revisions
Cost: $195 per student for 1 day seminar. $345 per student for 2 day seminar
BWC Video and Public Records
Who should attend: BWC program administrators & staff, Records personnel, PIO staff, Legal staff
Length: 2 Days
Overview:
The management and dissemination of BWC recordings is a rather, albeit unnecessarily, contentious issue in public safety. Whether or not the video shall be released according to the law is one matter while the decision to voluntarily release it is another. These issues are often conflated with the preservation of videos as “evidence”- a separate matter altogether from public records law. This 2-day course will provide an in-depth discussion of the nuances surrounding BWC video as a public record, review of state legal requirements, policy development exercise will be provided.
Topics include:
-
BWC public records release “philosophy”
-
BWC and Records policies including policy evaluation discussion for attending agencies
-
Collaboration between BWC program administrators and Records staff
-
The privacy balancing act
-
Privacy and your state law
-
State public records law discussion (tailored to your state)
-
State public records law and BWC policy
-
Refining policy: activation/de-activation, categorization, retention, notifications, release
-
Public records release processes
-
Implementing an effective and efficient BWC records release program
Cost: $345 per student
BWC Compliance and Auditing
Who should attend: BWC program administrators & staff, police managers and executives and police union staff
Length: 2 Days
Overview:
Once you have a body-worn camera program up and running it becomes the agency’s responsibility to ensure it is properly executed. Compliance and auditing processes must be in place. But just exactly are “compliance” and “auditing”? These terms, along with “monitoring” and “reviews”, are being used around the county to describe similar processes. These processes are frequently misunderstood, and programs designed to ensure compliance and audits are inadequate. BWC record more than just an officer’s actions. They document officers’ adherence to many of an agency’s policies and practices. Failure to ensure that the cameras are used properly can lead to a host of risks for the agency. But how do you verify compliance? The larger the agency, the harder this is to do. Technology from solution providers, is only part of the answer. Technology alone can’t totally ensure compliance. Only a well-designed compliance program can accomplish this. An additional requirement for a healthy BWC program is auditing. Auditing is essentially verifying that everything you say you’re doing is actually being done. It goes hand-in-hand with your compliance process. Audits provide, among other things, a documented record of process compliance. This can be critical to an agency in the aftermath of a controversial incident with legal and financial implications.
​
Topics include:
-
Compliance failure case studies
-
Defining compliance and why it’s important
-
How to design an effective compliance program
-
Compliance processes
-
The role of technology in the compliance process
-
What to do with what is discovered
-
Current compliance program evaluation discussion for attending agencies
-
Defining audits
-
Who should conduct an audit
-
How to design and conduct an audit program
-
Documenting the processes
-
Current audit program evaluation discussion for attending agencies
Cost: $345 per student
​
Heading 1
BWC Supervisor Review Program
​
Who should attend: BWC program administrators and staff, police supervisors and managers, union staff
Length: 1 Day
Overview:
It is a best practice to have supervisors routinely review the videos of their assigned personnel for performance management. This is a critical step in an agency’s overall BWC compliance program as well as its performance evaluation system. But just exactly should this be done? The challenge is balancing the review process within the seemingly ever-increasing amount of other supervisory tasks. And frequently, this tasked is interpreted by the agency to fulfill the agency’s responsibility of conducting an agency level compliance process which simply isn’t correct. But this misinterpretation puts an undue burden on supervisors and the chain of command. A poorly defined and executed supervisor review program can be misinterpreted by officers as a process by which supervisors can search for minor infractions leading to discipline. A well-designed review program provides another management tool for supervisors that helps improve, or commend, officer performance as well as identify agency level issues that may exist which are not connected to individual officer performance.
Topics include:
-
Defining a Supervisor Review Program and why having one is important
-
Components of an effective Supervisor Review Program
-
Program development
-
Program policy
-
Training supervisors and officers on the program
-
What to do with what is seen by supervisors
-
Technology support for the program
-
Documenting and archiving the process
Cost: $195 per student
​
​
​
​
Body-Worn Camera Program Management
Who should attend: BWC program administrators and staff, police managers
Length: 1 Day
Overview:
So, what do you do once you have a body-worn camera program up and running? There are a host of implied tasks associated with managing a program over time. Many agencies don’t think about, or discover, many of these program management requirements until after deployment and that can lead to problems. These administrative program management requirements will come under scrutiny when the agency experiences a controversial incident. Failure to anticipate these requirements and implement effective administrative process can lead to operational and liability disasters for the agency. This seminar covers the processes needed to ensure program success and improvement over time.
Topics include:
-
Centralized program management
-
Operation and user administration of the system
-
Compliance and audit process management
-
Monitoring, assessment, and revision of BWC policy and procedures
-
Operational and training feedback loops
-
BWC research
-
Agency reporting
-
Equipment management
-
IT collaboration
-
Vendor liaison
-
Records Section liaison
Cost: $195 per student
BWC as a Risk Management Tool
Who should attend: Body-worn camera program administrators and staff, police managers and executives
Length: 2 Days
Overview:
On almost any day you can turn on the local or national news and see a story about police misconduct or some other type of controversial incident. In the days, weeks and months following it, the community, the media, and the agency itself will scrutinize every aspect of the incident. The presence of BWC video can work to the advantage of the agency, or it could have huge negative impact. The agency is then forced to go into a reactive posture, using video of an incident to take corrective measures. However, BWC provide a capability to do more than document and react. The profession now as a tool that can allow insights to behavior, policies, practices, and training that could be detrimental to the agency and address issues before they become problems. But simply discovering these things isn’t enough. The agency must have a comprehensive and effective risk management process in place. This is not an easy endeavor. Many factors must be considered for any risk management process to become effective at mitigating, reducing or eliminating risk and make positive changes. This seminar presents both a reactive and proactive risk management model that is designed specifically around the use of body-worn camera video. It examines all the challenges to implementing the program as well as methods for evaluating success.
Topics include:
-
Case studies in risk management failures
-
A police risk management process model
-
How the model operates
-
Setting up the model and supporting program
-
Required resources
-
Identifying risk
-
Eliminating or mitigating risk
-
Evaluating effectiveness
-
What to do with the program outputs
Cost: $345 per student
BWC Training Programs
​
Who should attend: BWC program administrators & staff, Academy, field training and in-service training staff
Length: 1 or 2 day options. The two-day option provides a more comprehensive discussion of each of the included topical areas.
Overview:
Training is one area of BWC Program Management that is frequently done inadequately. Agencies, many times, rely on BWC manufacturers to conduct training for them. This training tends to be limited to operation of the cameras, associated hardware, and the evidence management software. Classes tend to be very short and lack the comprehensive scope and testing that is truly required. Additionally, agencies tend to neglect supervisory and management training, recurring training, and annual certifications. BWC provide an opportunity to enhance many agency training programs such as field training, tactical training, firearms qualifications, defensive tactics and constitutional policing. This seminar provides recommendations and processes for effectively integrating BWC into agency training programs regardless of how long an agency has had cameras.
Topics include:
-
BWC training program development
-
Initial deployment training and revisions
-
Recurring training
-
Annual recertification
-
Supervisor, administrative and leader training
-
BWC in the Academy
-
BWC in Field Training
-
BWC in specialized training programs (firearms, defensive tactics, tactical, crowd control)
-
Technology and BWC training
-
BWC specific training curriculum development and documentation
Cost: $195 per student for 1 day seminar. $400 per student for 2 day seminar.
.png)
BWC and Prosecutors
​
Who should attend: Prosecutors, BWC program administrators and staff, agency legal staff
Length: 1 Day
Overview:
The goal of this seminar is to provide both prosecutors and BWC staff from the agencies they work with, a better understanding of all aspects of BWC operations to enhance outcomes in court. The seminar will provide prosecutors with the knowledge they need to handle all aspects of BWC's from ingesting the evidence to presenting in court and everything in between. It will delve into the technology of the cameras, how they are employed by police departments, issues related to on-premises and cloud storage, video management and retrieval, and best practices for transfer of video to prosecutors. The impact of BWC video on reports and Brady/Giglio, best practices for motions work, trial preparation and actual use in trial will thoroughly be covered. Police attendees will gain an understanding of the challenges faced by prosecutors and how best to efficiently and effectively support them. Attendance by both prosecutors and police staff is encouraged to facilitate an open exchange of ideas and solutions.
Topics include:
-
Best practices for police case management with BWC evidence
-
Collaboratively developing an effective video evidence transfer system
-
Ingesting video evidence to prosecutor case or evidence management system
-
Effective use the videos for issuance decision evaluation
-
Understanding BWC’s in the discovery and Brady/Giglio framework from law enforcement and prosecution perspectives
-
Judicial and juror insight into BWC content, impact and use in court
-
How to prepare as a prosecutor and a police officer in offering and explaining videos being introduced as evidence
-
Insight into defense cross examination and motion issues
-
Storage and retention of video evidence by police and prosecutors
Cost: $195 per student
​
.png)
Critical Issues in BWC Programs
Who should attend: Police department executives and body-worn camera program administrators.
Length: 1 Day
Overview:
This seminar consists of presentations followed by facilitated, interactive, discussions on key issues critical to successful implementation of a body-worn camera program. The goal is to provide a professional learning environment where attendees can receive presentations on these issues and have discussions with exchanges of ideas that can lead to preparing for and overcoming challenges. Topics for this seminar change based on national trends.
Current Topics include:
· BWC in the current political and social environment
· Your organizational culture and BWC
· Effective management of your BWC program
· Current policy “traps”
· Compliance and Audits
· Records and Retention Challenges
· BWCs in risk management
· Technology procurement
· Live streaming
Cost: $250 per student for 1 day seminar.
End of Course Descriptions