Teen, Citizens Academy Graduates Pay It Forward as FBI Community Outreach Specialists Program alumni building bridges between the Bureau and the people it serves
New York – Rashad Alkhader – Free Yemen Eye – From News – FBI
FBI community outreach specialists serve as ambassadors for the FBI. They forge partnerships with local, state, and national nonprofits, community groups, businesses, and academia to strengthen the Bureau’s relationship with the people it serves; and support our mission to protect the nation and uphold the Constitution.
They accomplish this by researching the things that matter to the people they serve and traveling to literally—and figuratively—meet community members where they’re at.
But outreach specialists also cultivate these relationships by inviting members of the public inside the world of the Bureau through the FBI’s Teen Academy and Citizens Academy programs. These selective programs give outstanding young people and adult community leaders, respectively, crash-courses in all-things FBI.
Some program alumni are so moved by their experiences that they pursue careers with the Bureau. Two such individuals—Teen Academy graduate Bella Crepeaux and Citizens Academy graduate Jay Mroszczak—are now paying it forward as the next generation of FBI community outreach specialists.
Citizens Academy Spotlight: Jay Mroszczak
From serving his country to serving his community
Long before he became an official ambassador for the FBI Chicago Field Office, Jay Mroszczak was an Army soldier who aspired to become a special agent.
“As a matter of fact, when I was still on active duty in the Army with about 16 years of service in, I put in a packet for special agent,” he said, noting that he made it all the way through the application process. However, he decided not to pursue the job and instead focused on his military career.
Years later, that calling found him again when his friends nominated the retired Army veteran to attend a Citizens Academy at the FBI Kansas City Field Office. Jay might’ve hung up his uniform by the time he was nominated to attend the FBI Kansas City Citizens Academy, but he was by no means finished giving back to his country and community.
Jay recalled being astounded by the professionalism of the FBI personnel who addressed him and his classmates each week.
“They were personable,” he said. “They never acted like we were an imposition on their time when questions were asked and they had to stay late.”
He especially loved the academy’s range day, when participants meet FBI firearms instructors and SWAT team members. “It very much reminded me of the people I worked with in the military,” Jay said.
His experience with the course was so positive that it inspired him to join the FBI Kansas City Citizens Academy Alumni Association. This group is a local chapter of the FBI National Citizens Academy Alumni Association, an independent nonprofit that partners with the FBI on its outreach efforts.
“The alumni chapters work hand-in-hand with the field offices, and they participate in initiatives and events,” said Tracey Ballinger, a management and program analyst with the FBI’s Community Relations Unit, which oversees the Bureau’s Citizens Academy program. “And at the end of the day, they want to help further the mission of the FBI.”
Jay went on to become an officer with the Kansas City chapter before joining the National Citizens Academy Alumni Association’s board of directors. Then, “the opportunity came to go back to work for the federal government again, and I was putting in several applications to the FBI,” he said. He was soon invited to interview for a community outreach specialist position in Chicago.
The opportunity would capitalize on his passion for working with people—and seemed like fun, he said. His experience with the Citizens Academy program and its alumni network and his familiarity with the outreach specialist job also informed his decision to take the job.
“I just felt like I had a very good working knowledge of what I was getting into,” he said.
To his day, he said, he works to emulate the example of the community outreach specialist who steered his own Citizens Academy experience. “She was just a benchmark of what an outreach specialist should be,” Jay said, noting that he works to bring that same energy and hunger for learning when he works on programming for FBI Chicago.
Responding to tragedy is a more sobering part of the job description, but Jay says the power of the partnerships that these specialists build becomes crucial in these scenarios.
Jay is a firm believer in tapping into the power of the Citizens Academy network—both current participants and alumni—as proverbial community outreach reservists when crisis strikes.
And he’d know, since he serves as one of FBI Chicago’s crisis managers, and helped provide backup to the agents who investigated the mass shooting in Highland Park, Illinois, last July.
Jay also praised the power of FBI Community Engagement Councils—which he said unite “community leaders from all the different various ethnic and religious communities”—to help ensure the flow of timely information between the Bureau and the public after crises strike.
This communication ensures communities know what steps the FBI is taking in the wake of a tragedy; eases their worries about aftershocks of violence; and educates them about how they can provide tips to the Bureau to aid investigations.
Jay said his primary advice to aspiring outreach specialists is not to be afraid to put themselves out there—even if you’re an introvert like he is.
He also stressed the importance of being reliable, dependable, and organized; and never making a promise you can’t keep. His advice for avoiding burnout in the wake of crises was similarly straightforward: Stay professional and get the job done. “Once the dust settles and everything’s over, then you can sit back and take a sigh of relief,” he said. “Just being a part of something larger than yourself and being a part of the team that’s investigating that and trying to take care of the people in the community, it keeps the adrenaline running and keeps you going.”
FBI Citizens Academy
The FBI’s Citizens Academy program, which began in 1993, aims to transform local leaders into ambassadors for the Bureau in the communities where they live and work. The program, which runs weekly over six-to-eight weeks, looks to foster a greater understanding of the role of federal law enforcement in the community through frank discussion and education.
Current Bureau employees, Citizens Academy alumni, and community leaders may nominate someone to attend a Citizens Academy program. The head of the hosting FBI field office then picks members of class from that pool.
Visit your local FBI field office’s homepage, then navigate to the Community Outreach tab, to learn how to nominate yourself or someone you know for a Citizens Academy near you.
Childhood dream turned reality
Bella Crepeaux took her first step towards a career with the Bureau as a high school student in 2016, when she applied to a Teen Academy hosted in her hometown of Portland, Oregon.
The Teen Academy program’s goal is to inspire participants to consider futures in law enforcement. In Bella’s case, it worked.
“We came, and we interacted with FBI agents,” she recalled of her Teen Academy experience. “We learned about the different threats the FBI covers. We did mock crime-scene investigation—just a whole wide range of things that I was really interested in at the time.”
After the weeklong Academy, Bella said, her dream of working for the Bureau was solidified, and her mind was made up.
