D.E.A. bat

[recontroy]

Anyone have any info. on D.E.A. basic agent training or info. on how well you like working in D.E.A.

[Chick]

http://www.usdoj.gov/dea/directory.htm

and the academy here http://www.usdoj.gov/dea/programs/training.htm

Basic Agent Training

Over the past five years, the Office of Training has graduated over 1,800 DEA Special Agents from our Basic Agent Training program. Typically, class sizes range from 40 to 50 Basic Agent trainees. The average age of these students is 30 years. Approximately 60 percent of all trainees arrive with prior law enforcement experience, while 30 percent come from a military background. Every student must possess a bachelor's degree and nearly 20 percent have some post-graduate educational experience.

The curriculum is a 16-week resident program that places strong emphasis upon leadership, ethics, and human dignity. Academic instruction provides the basics of report writing, law, automated information systems, and drug recognition, as well as leadership and ethics. Underpinning the instruction is a rigorous 84-hour physical fitness and defensive tactics regimen designed to prepare new Special Agents to prevail in compliant and non-compliant arrest scenarios.

Students receive 120 hours of firearms training including basic marksmanship, weapons safety, tactical shooting, and deadly force decision training. An integral part of Basic Agent training is an emphasis upon respect for human life, leadership and ethics, human dignity, and sound judgment in the use of deadly force. During the training, students are required to apply their classroom knowledge in a series of increasingly demanding practical exercises designed to test leadership, decisiveness, and knowledge of procedures and techniques that will be used in the field.

In order to graduate, students must maintain an academic average of 80 percent on academic examinations, pass the firearms qualification test, successfully demonstrate leadership and sound decision-making in practical scenarios, and pass rigorous physical task tests. Upon graduation, students are sworn in as DEA Special Agents and assigned to DEA field offices located across the United States.

[Bradleyadleo]

I think she said it all :P

[Chick]

Oh no, I just copied and pasted that from the website.

[JamesRyan]

Does anyone know how many people get hired once they have made it past the background check? To be specific, what do you think the average is for people that get picked by the hiring panel for an academy slot?

[Group9]

Originally posted by recontroy
Anyone have any info. on D.E.A. basic agent training or info. on how well you like working in D.E.A.

I think most DEA agents would tell you they like it.

The pros:
There are a lot of different things you can do.
You can be in a lot of different kinds of groups that work a lot of different drugs, anthing from large international conspiracy cases to going out and making street buys in a MET group. You can go undercover and you can see lots of places traveling as you expand investigations.

You can apply to go overseas after a few years and choose from about 58 different countries. Some of the countries are nice tourist destinations, and some of them are so bad you will have an M-4 in your residence and be issued an armored car.

You can do a tour in training, either training new agents, state and locals or police in different countries.

You receive minimal supervision and are expected to run your own cases.

You receive pretty decent pay, starting out as a GS-7 LEO scale with LEAP and going up to a GS-13 journeyman. Most agents have topped out at federal maximum allowed pay before they retire.

The cons
It is very much the government. Expect to frequently be discourage or dissapointed when their goals and aspirations do not necessarily match yours. There is a lot of paperwork. It ain't all kicking doors and riding around in helicopters.

DEA can be very unfeeling when it comes to an agent's personal life and there is a joke in the agency that has a lot of truth to it "If DEA had wanted you to have a family, they would have issued you one."

If you can't self motivate and self manage yourself, you are going to have problems.

That said, on the whole, I have found it to be a very challenging and rewarding career. As one of my friends in the agency likes to say, "This is such a good job, they (management) can't even make it bad when they try."

[recontroy]

Thanks for the input. I'm currently a state police drug agent and have applied with the D.E.A. and the Postal Inspection Service. I'm trying to decide which position would be best for me. I enjoy what I do now but I'm concerned that 10 years from now I will be bored with drug work. Most of the D.E.A agents I have worked with enjoy their work, however, I have met many that are unhappy as a result of their administration. I do beleive that I would enjoy working in the D.E.A. more than the U.S.P.I.S. but they have many advantages. The starting pay is at the GS-9 level, you are told prior to the academy where you will be stationed, and I have yet to meet a disatisfied Inspector. Once again thanks for your input. I would appreciate any other input you might have. Thanks.