MONTEGO BAY, St James — Head boys and girls, graduates leaving school with impressive passes under their belts, and individuals with degrees are the type of applicants now eyeing a career in the Jamaica Constabulary Force (JCF), according to the country’s top cop Major General Antony Anderson.

He credits the organisation’s improved image and professionalism for the ability to attract a better pool of applicants.

“As people interact with us more and more and start to see some of the things we’re doing, you get a different look and feel about the force,” he told journalists on Thursday during a town hall meeting at the Montego Bay Civic Centre, in Sam Sharpe Square.

The police force, he said, typically hires 12,000 fresh faces every year. In the past, many hires took the job as a last resort but, according to Anderson that is changing. Pointing to some of the technology on display at the event, he painted a picture of a police force that is well on its way to being state-of-the-art, which makes it a more attractive career choice.

“We will later on this year be running an expo that will allow a wider community to come and see some of the things that were shown at the back. It is just the tip of the iceberg,” stated Anderson regarding the technology on display.

The police have started to utilise and will roll out in full as time goes by, gadgets such as mobile fingerprint machines capable of providing a police record, a mobile traffic ticketing system and body cameras.

“When it comes to some of the things that the force is doing, it wasn’t by accident that we went after ISO 9001 certification,” said Anderson.

The commissioner said certification for aspects of the JCF began last summer and the process of expanding its ISO certification to other places has begun.

“What that means is that your police force is holding itself to a standard in these areas that is internationally recognised and is audited, and trackable and traceable and data is there to support the things we say,” he explained.

Over the past four years, the JCF has made significant improvements to its training capabilities with the addition of three more police college training locations which gives the organisation the capacity to provide 800 new personnel per year.

“For the first time in memory perhaps, we went to 12,500 by the end of last financial year. By the end of this one, I am looking at being at 13,000 [lawmen],” said Anderson.

This, he said means he can now better respond to requests for additional personnel, for example in St James where he knows more cops are needed. He stressed the need for not just bodies but well-trained personnel.

“I want additional professional police officers. I don’t want boots because the reality is… numbers are not gonna solve our problem. We need to add professional police officers. What does that mean? It means that I have to go and recruit the right sort of young person. I have to vet them to ensure that I take in the right sort and then I have to expose them to high- quality training. And I have to do this in such a way that it really doesn’t matter which of the four institutions you go to when you come out, you can deliver policing to the same standard,” Anderson explained.