CJUS 520

Policy Development Research Paper: Draft Assignment Instructions

Overview

Law enforcement organizations are facing a tremendous problem with social media. On one hand, social media such as Facebook, My Space, and Twitter can be extremely useful for effective and efficient communication. On the other hand, law enforcement executives are constantly facing situations in which employee misconduct is occurring through social media. Police officers are accessing social media from their workstations and patrol cars during their shifts. Police officers are posting information that is unbecoming for an officer as well as degrading and disrespectful to the profession. Police unions and police officer organizations such as the Fraternal Order of Police and the PBA are opposed to departmental policies that infringe on police officers’ constitutional rights. How do law enforcement organizations regulate the use of social media? Just about every major law enforcement organization has a Facebook account associated with the organization’s website. Therefore, should law enforcement organizations regulate individual officer’s social media activity?

Instructions

As the policy manager for your law enforcement organization, please research the best practices related to the regulation of police officers’ use of social media and develop a department policy. This research should include interviews with your local law enforcement leaders to determine how they are addressing this issue. In addition, please read the “Social Media” study conducted by the International Association of Chiefs of Police; it can be found in the Resources section.

The paper must consist of the following:

· Minimum of 5 full pages excluding the title page, abstract, and reference pages.

· Minimum of at least 3 scholarly/governmental sources.

· Current APA formatting.

· Acceptable sources (course textbooks, academic books, peer-reviewed journal articles published within the last 5-10 years only). 

This assignment requires that students follow a template. Students must review and follow the template carefully. Students must include a running header, title page, abstract (between 120-250 words), proper APA headings/subheadings and a reference page.  Please note that students are asked not to omit any of the bold headings that are already clearly named in the template.  Students are only asked to add/rename the APA headings/subheadings to keep the paper organized, and to insert their written content into the appropriate sections of the template.   

Note: Your assignment will be checked for originality via the Turnitin plagiarism tool.