You’re an Instructor. Now What?
by David Millican, PCI #1006T/EMSCI #343T
Denton (TX) Police Department
IPMBA Education Coordinator
You have been cycling on duty for several years and it has become engrained in your daily public safety activities. It has become part of your lifestyle and an enjoyable aspect of your employment. You have proven your skills and abilities, and been asked by your administration to become a cycling instructor. They see having an in-house instructor as a benefit to them, but you can also use the opportunity to challenge yourself and expand your career limits.
Every year, IPMBA has nearly a hundred new instructors join the instructor cadre and enter into a new dimension of their careers. Indeed, this is a great accomplishment, and many say it is hands-down the best and most challenging course of their career. They also say it is not a typical public safety training course. It is very time-intensive and demanding. Those who successfully earn their IPMBA Instructor certificates should be very proud of their accomplishment.
You have reached the pinnacle, the peak, the ultimate level of public safety cycling; you are an IPMBA Instructor, but now what? When you return to your home agency, you begin reviewing and studying the lecture outlines, the PowerPoints, and the skill stations. That is an excellent place to start, but you should also add to your knowledge by seeking out additional resources, such as articles from fellow instructors on the Instructor Resources page on the IPMBA website. Don’t just rest on what you learned in the 40+ hour Instructor Course; expand your knowledge base.
IPMBA’s vision is that by developing comprehensive training programs, strengthening its instructor network, and embracing new technologies, it will continue to be the premier public safety cycling training organization. IPMBA cannot achieve this vision without its instructor cadre, of which you are now a part.
In many agencies, instructors have only occasional opportunities to teach, and that is often to just a few of their own personnel. However, I challenge you to incorporate IPMBA’s vision into your training. Invite members of other agencies to your course and learn from one another. Prepare yourself for teaching; for many, it doesn’t come naturally. Develop the enthusiasm and passion you’ve seen in other instructors that comes from passing your knowledge onto others. Everyone has something they can pass on.
Prepare for teaching the skill stations by reviewing the teaching points for each skill and put them on cue cards. Practice and rehearse the lectures without students being present. Instructor Trainers often tell students to practice their presentations in the mirror. I have a vivid memory of a regional Instructor Course during which an older Instructor Trainer was sitting out on the balcony of our hotel room, talking to himself. Oh wait, he was just rehearsing.
Teach outside of the IPMBA course as much as possible. Collaborate with other organizations that support the recruitment and education of cyclists. Get certified as a civilian cycling instructor through the League of American Bicyclists, Cycling Savvy, or CAN-BIKE. Teach in bicycle rodeos and to school children.
Attracting a diverse membership is necessary in order to follow innovative trends and approaches to technology within instructing and cycling. The cadre of IPMBA instructors is as unique as individuals that comprise it. Each instructor has their own style, and brings a set of skills and abilities that others may not possess. Don’t be selfish; share your knowledge with the rest of us. Think outside the box with how bicycles could be utilized in other areas of public safety. An interesting workshop proposed for the 2020 IPMBA Conference brought together swift water rescue and public safety cyclists. Who knew?
What is your specialty? Develop lesson plans for topics and courses close to your heart. This will bring passion and enthusiasm into your instruction. Think about how your unique skills, knowledge, and experience can be translated into an article, workshop, or in-service training module. For starters, a workshop can be a one-hour lecture. Later you can build and expand upon it into multiple hours or even ultimately incorporate it into other training classes.
Introduce our members, the board and even the public to new innovative approaches to public safety cycling. The potential is endless. Challenge your limits and plumb the depths of your creativity. Step outside your comfort zone. I did this in 2008, just one year after becoming an instructor, with a lecture called “Introduction to Mountain Bike Use in Search and Rescue”. This evolved into a four-hour workshop with a practical exercise, which was later incorporated as a block of instruction in the PESC II course.
I recall a workshop taught by another instructor in 2007 called “Drafting for Speed and Endurance”. This concept is taken from professional cycling and the drafting techniques utilized within a peloton. Drafting occurs when a cyclist moves into an area of low pressure behind another cyclist, reducing the wind resistance and the amount of energy required to pedal. Practicing drafting can decrease your response time to calls and increase your physiological ability to handle the call once you arrive.
In a typical fall, IPMBA puts out a call for instructors and workshop proposals for the following year’s conference. This is the opportunity for IPMBA Instructors to request to teach a course at the conference and/or submit a workshop for consideration. One of the responsibilities of the Education Coordinator is to review these proposals and make recommendations. This isn’t a typical fall, but I suspect we will see one on “Teaching during a Pandemic” in the future.
Developing a workshop is an effective way to showcase your skills, knowledge and unique training abilities. Conducting workshops can also put you on the path to being selected to teach a course and becoming an Instructor Trainer. We welcome, encourage, and enjoy seeing new approaches and topics each year. While we do not yet know what 2021 will hold, do not let that stop you. Be creative and innovative. At the very least, you will end up with an in-service training module for the agencies you teach as well as a proposal for a future IPMBA training event, or perhaps an article for the IPMBA News.
David has been with the Denton Police Department since 1999 and on the bike team since 2002. He is currently working as a detective in the Criminal Investigations Division. He has completed the Police Cyclist, Public Safety Cyclist II, NO-FATs, MOCC, and MMR-IPMBA Core Skills and Scenarios Clinic. He was certified as an IPMBA Instructor in 2007 and earned the status of Instructor-Trainer in 2017. He is also a TCOLE defensive tactics and firearms instructor and has served as an FTO. He holds a BA in Biology from the University of North Texas and attended paramedic school at North Central Texas College. He has held certifications as a paramedic, swift water rescue, and NASAR SAR Tech II. He was elected to the IPMBA Board of Directors in April 2019 and currently serves as Education Coordinator. He can be reached at dsmillican@gmail.com.
(c) IPMBA. This article appeared in the 2020 Board Issue of IPMBA News.