Amarillo Police Academy holds 100th graduation ceremony Friday

AMARILLO, Texas (KFDA) - The Amarillo Police Academy held its 100th graduation ceremony today and welcomed 12 new officers to the force.

“100 academies is incredible, that it just shows that we’ve been able to consistently stay within the requirements,” said Sergeant Carla Burr with the Amarillo Police Department.

Not only is the Amarillo Police Department staying within requirement guidelines for the academy, they also continuously work to implement teaching techniques to produce knowledgeable officers.

“They put them through scenarios, if somebody breaks this law or if you have this circumstance or whatever, so it gets them kind of thinking about it constantly,” said Sgt. Burr.

Recent graduates say they are looking forward to keeping up with the important traditions of the Amarillo police force.

“Caring about the community, being involved, closing that gap to make sure that we have a good relationship with the community. You know, that’s the one thing they promote so we want to take everything that we’ve learned and now it’s our turn to get in there and build our own relationships with the community,” said Class President of the 100th Academy, Officer Sarah Dimas.

Officer Alexis Gonzales says the tradition and bond of brother and sisterhood is what keeps driving the passion for the job.

“Now we have brothers in blue, sisters in blue and it doesn’t matter you know what goes on, you hear those sirens coming, your family’s coming,” said recent graduate Officer Gonzales.

City Council members, the mayor, family and friends all gathered to celebrate not only the officers, but everyone who played a vital role in the academy being what it is today.

“100 years of police work and to be able to have been given the opportunity to work alongside so many awesome officers and you know absorb all their knowledge that they’ve given us all these years. You know to be as successful as I’ve been has been because of them,” said Officer Gonzales.

Sgt. Burr says seeing the cadets get to this point always reminds her the importance of the job and why she joined the force.

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