TOWN OF TONAWANDA, N.Y. — As a mother of two police officers, Barbara McDonald spends a lot of time wondering about what her sons face while on the job.
"I watched both my sons go through the police academy, and I felt it was my turn."
She added: "I wanted to get an understanding of what it is that they do day to day when they are out in their patrol cars.I just felt that I needed some more knowledge."
McDonald signed herself up for the Town of Tonawanda Police Department's Citizens Police Academy. It's a free course for people who want to learn about the inner-workings of a police department.
"It's actually like a scaled down police academy," Detective Gary Reinhart said.
For the last 33 years, the department has been training citizens on the basics of police work, including, accident investigation, fingerprinting, and crime scene investigation.
Since it's inception, more than 600 people have gone through the training, and 10 of them have become Town of Tonawanda police officers.
"I teach the forensics portion, and in the advanced class we go more into crime scene investigation. We'll set up mock crime scenes and have them use all the tools they've learned in previous classes to try and solve the crime," Reinhart said.
For McDonald, it's about knowing the dangers her sons face.
"They don't know what they are going to be walking up to when they walk up to that person in that vehicle," she said.
For Kathryn Brysinski, it's about knowing how to handle a dangerous situation.
"What to do in the event of mass violence or a mass shooting especially because I work in an office setting," Brysinski said.
Once the 12-week program ends, those who complete it will be welcomed into other volunteer programs where they will be used in emergency situations.
"It's the Citizens Emergency Response Team, so any major incident that would happen in the town, we would call in these volunteers to help with traffic or other stuff like that," Reinhart said.
Even if they never use the skills, some say the biggest takeaway is this:
"I feel that every police officer that is out on the street is treating every call as if it's life or death. And they really do deserve our respect," McDonald said.