Introduction
There are several opportunities for a challenging yet rewarding career and being a police officer is one of such avenues. Police officers have the honorable duty of protecting their community, giving aid to people in need of it, and fighting crime. In this article, the salary of Pennsylvania State police officers are explained in detail; as well as the peculiarity of the duties they perform and the processes you would need to go through to become a police officer.
Read on to find out all of this important information.
What are the details of the work policemen do?
Mind you, in your work as a police officer, you will experience several demanding and onerous situations quite regularly.
People tend to call on the police for almost everything. You may get called for small issues like noise disturbances, squabbles between neighbors, and lost pets. And the situations can also be really frightening like getting reports of an armed robbery, burglary, violent fights among others.
Although it cannot be denied that being a police officer as a career entails a possibility of regularly being in danger, the work by itself has its rewards and can be very gratifying especially in the role of being a protector.
Police departments in the entire country ensure that the police officers in their departments are dedicated to their primary duty of being protectors to the members of their community.
The heads of the police departments seek principled persons who have the candid goal of ensuring that the members of their communities have a safe place to live and pursue their business endeavors.
The standard police officer aspires to give assistance to people and to lessen the scale of crime in the community.
The duties of a police officer typically include:
- Providing first responder services in response to emergency events. Carrying out this task as a police officer requires making quick decisions regarding complicated, hostile, or critical situations to deescalate the situation to the best of their ability.
- Carrying out threat and risk level evaluations regarding a convoluted set of circumstances. For example, clashes between neighborhood rivals.
- Conducting investigations into unlawful events or potential offenses, presiding over crime scenes and any evidence extracted from such scenes, and managing suspects. An example would be a traffic accident that leads to death.
- Dispensing leadership services to members of the public and assisting victims, witnesses of crimes, and other vulnerable groups of persons.
- Engaging in local partnerships that prove to be strategic to solving problems, working with and providing support to local societies, groups, and persons in the community.
How to get the job of a police officer?
If you’ve gone to interview for the position of a police officer, the interviewer may ask why you have chosen to become a police officer out of all available careers, despite its risks.
It is important, therefore, that you first understand your own motives, and learn to explain them in the clearest and most convincing manner when the question comes.
Skills and qualifications you need to get the job
Should you be contemplating a professional path in the police force, the following is a list of soft skills and qualifications you might need to display at opportune moments:
- Efficient communication abilities that include displaying instances of diplomacy and tact that prove useful in tackling delicate issues.
- A focus on community
- A high consciousness of accountability, ethics, and adaptability.
- Analytical skills and the ability to solve problems
- A self-assured and composed disposition
- A level of literacy or proficiency that helps with documentation specifics and reports writing.
- High interpersonal skills in addition to the capability to work independently.
Career opportunities in Pennsylvania
If you are considering a career path in law enforcement, specifically the police force, Pennsylvania is a great place to begin.
There is a broad spectrum of career opportunities available in the various state law enforcement agencies. Police officers refer to all ranks in the agency including the state troopers and the Sheriff’s deputies.
With such an extensive variety of positions in law enforcement agencies, there is a higher possibility for positive career advancement.
Regarding officer recruitment, the state of Pennsylvania provides a broad range of career opportunities. In a guide written by the how-to-be-a-police-officer website, it is estimated that there are about 27, 460 police officers and Sheriffs in the state of Pennsylvania alone.
There are also ongoing recruitment exercises occurring in several major police agencies in the state. The guide goes on to provide detailed information on the requirements inclusive of the state and local levels which are outlined below.
Pennsylvania State Law Enforcement Requirements
As is the case with other states in the country, the state of Pennsylvania also has its requirements which potential candidates must satisfy before they can be considered qualified for service.
The regulatory body which is in charge of managing the procedure of becoming a police officer, Sheriff, or Sheriff’s deputy is the Municipal Police Officers’ Education and Training Commission (MPOETC).
The body sets the minimum standard requirements. However, it should be noted that local departments may specify their independent requirements in addition to the requirements of the state.
An instance would be where the MPOETC demands a high school diploma or a GED equivalent, while the local department may demand an associate degree or a higher degree.
Even in instances where a college degree is not required to be employed as a police officer, many of the local departments would approve of a college experience.
The minimum standards outlined by the MPOETC to qualify for employment as a police officer in the state of Pennsylvania are as follows:
- A minimum of 18 years of age
- Possession of a high school diploma or a GED equivalent
- Possession of US citizenship
- Lack of a record of criminal records that would act as a disqualifying factor
- Possession of a literary ability that is at a minimum of a 9th grade level
- Possession of acute vision of at least 20/70 which should be correctable to 20/20
- Scoring at least 30th percentile in physical fitness requirements in line with Cooper Institute Standards.
The MPOETC also provides guidelines and requirements for the employment of Troopers or Highway Patrol officers in addition to the Sheriff’s deputy across the 67 counties in the state of Pennsylvania.
Requisite Examinations
Anybody who is aspiring to be employed as a police officer has to undergo a full background check the outcome of which must show a spotless criminal offense record in addition to accepting credit history and prior employment record.
Another aspect of the examination process is a comprehensive interview which typically involves a polygraph and drug test.
In addition to undergoing the background check and the in-person interview, their outcomes must exemplify that the applicant is ethical and has integrity and should hold members of law enforcement in high esteem.
Persons who aspire to be Police officers in Pennsylvania are also required to undergo a succession of physical, medical, and mental evaluations. The aspirants typically undergo the physical fitness tests first before the other two.
Other tests typically involve the Nelson-Denny Reading Test and a personality test that is usually computer-administered.
After all of these is a mental assessment carried by a licensed mental health professional and a medical examination, performed by a licensed doctor.
How much do policemen earn?
As a profession, being a police officer provides a robust income with enough windows of opportunity for advancement. But as earlier stated, it is an exacting career with routine requirements that rarely get disruptive.
It is an equal tasking job both mentally and physically, with the need for top-notch emotional intelligence, in-depth comprehension of personal behavior in the cultural or social context of each community, in addition to having the ability to evaluate rapidly-changing situations and quickly finding solutions to them.
The legal status of an employed police officer is a unique one, due to each officer possessing a warranted status which means every police officer is equipped to execute lawful, sovereign decisions that typically include restricting an individual’s liberty, especially when required by certain circumstances.
Police officers are also furnished with a broad spectrum of prerogatives that they employ to maintain order and enforce the law over the various communities with divergent members.
All members of the police force must also reckon with all their actions through the various legal instruments inclusive of the courts, justifying each action while being subject to the constant scrutiny of members of the public.
The term police officer refers to all possible ranks that exist within the police department.
In Pennsylvania, the standard salary for police officers and Sheriff patrol officers is estimated to be around $66, 460.
There is a positive course being experienced by professionals in law enforcement careers.
The how-to-be-a-police-officer website projects that the employment of police officers in Pennsylvania is on the rise and is forecasted to increase by 4.1% in 2026.
The table below shows the estimated average annual salary by location.
| City | Average Income per annum |
| Allentown-Bethlehem-Easton | $66,790 |
| Philadelphia | $70,500 |
| Pittsburgh | $63,050 |
| Scranton-Wilkes-Barre-Hazleton | $54,050 |
Are members of the Pennsylvania State Police the best paid in the country?
No, they are not.
The best-paid policemen, according to an article in Forbes magazine in 2020, are in California.
Other states that make up the top 5 states where policemen are paid the most money are Alaska, New Jersey, Washington and Hawaii.
