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How to Become An Air Marshal
As most people are aware, tragedies can occur when dangerous people fly. Because of that, the Transportation Security Administration (which is part of the US Department of Homeland Security) enlists men and women to protect our flights. These brave souls are known as air marshals.
Air marshals are tasked with deterring, detecting, and defeating hostile acts that target airports, passengers, aircraft carriers, and crews. If this is something that piques your interest, there are a number of steps that need to be taken to join these elite men and women.
Knowing how to become an air marshal is not enough to join the forces. An education, additional training, and a lot of hard work are required. While becoming an air marshal may not require a formal education, it is a good step in the right direction to attempt to set you apart from the crowd.
The first few steps to becoming an air marshal include a preliminary qualification screening and suitability assessment, mental health and psycho-social screening, panel interview, supervisory air marshal evaluation and recommendation, drug testing, fingerprinting, background investigation, and medical/fitness evaluation.
The next step on how to become an air marshal, after all of the previously stated steps, is a two phase fifteen-week training program. The first phase is a basic police training program, followed by air marshal-specific training.
So you may ask why the steps on how to become an air marshal would require a formal education. Besides the basic knowledge you will acquire through your studies, you are able to specialize in many fields that would be important to this career. Criminal justice, criminal psychology, and any other appropriate law enforcement courses will put you ahead of the crowd.
Balancing Life and School
Going back to college can be a difficult prospect for any age group or schedule. Depending on how quickly you plan to graduate, you may end up working as many hours as a full-time job if not more. Keeping a balance in work, family, life, and school has become easier in the past years as many students that go back to college have discovered the advantages of getting an online degree.
Many schools have capitalized on the online college idea and just as many traditional schools are offering online courses to make it easier for people to return to school. Finding the right school will require legwork and research. Counselors can often help students to find the right fit. Schools like the University of Phoenix offer online classes with satellite buildings for labs or other tasks that require you to physically appear for a part of the class. On the other hand, many community colleges offer online courses as you work towards your associate’s degree. Make sure that you research the university you plan to attend to make sure your credit hours will transfer to their school. Most students have found that they can go back to college exclusively online.
When you think about the steps involved in how to become an air marshal, you can see the advantages of online courses. You can continue to work and attend school on a more open schedule.
