Rhode Island State Police troopers are an elite few. Can they also be diverse?

Twenty-nine new troopers graduated from the Rhode Island State Police Training Academy on June 21, 2024, at a ceremony at the Community College of Rhode Island in Lincoln. Only 5% of applicants to the Class of 2024 were accepted and completed the 23-week training academy. (Rhode Island State Police photo)

Capt. Kenneth D. Jones might be wearing a blue uniform instead of the black and red of the Rhode Island State Police if he hadn’t seen a trooper doing his job.

At the time, Jones had been thinking about joining the Massachusetts State Police after leaving the Marine Corps. On his way home from a career fair in Newport, he saw a Rhode Island State Trooper conducting a traffic stop on Route 24 in Tiverton. The trooper had a walk and presence that compelled Jones to do “a brief rubberneck.”

So did the fact that the trooper, like Jones, was a man of color.

“It reminds me of what my mother taught me growing up: If you see it, then you can achieve it,” said Jones, a 27-year State Police veteran.

But Jones acknowledged a certain reality: Most applicants to the State Police are white males. In 2023, white men comprised 75% of its ranks. Women represented about 10%, while people of color of all genders were 17% of troopers. Black men comprised about 8% of troopers.

Since 2020, diversifying and engaging different communities has been part of Jones’ job description as head of the State Police’s Community, Diversity & Equity Unit.

Twenty-nine troopers out of 629 applicants were in the most recent Rhode Island State Police Training Academy class, which graduated on June 21. They included four Black men, one Hispanic or Latino man and four women, two of whom are Hispanic. The 2022 graduating class included one Black woman, one Black man, four Hispanic men and 24 white men.

Applications for the next academy class are due Aug. 31 . Jones is excited about the prospect of more applicants, who must be between the ages of 18 and 35: For the first time since he joined the force in 1997, the Rhode Island State Police Training Academy will be offered two years in a row.

A State Police ad uploaded to its YouTube channel June 13 devotes approximately 20 seconds of its 100-second runtime to depicting women officers as they write citations, inspect trucks, do push-ups and analyze data on monitors. It devotes about the same time to officers of color. The promotional spot showcases a trooper in therapy, too. Also featured is the less therapeutic Lenco Bearcat, a 17,000-pound armored vehicle that speaks to the State Police’s paramilitary aspects.

One artist will be picked to humanize the Rhode Island State Police. No statues, please.

The 23-week training academy typically runs every two to four years because of budget constraints, Jones said. That financial pressure was relieved partly in the fiscal 2024 budget, which allocated $1.6 million for the 2024 training academy class. The funding was to train 40 new troopers. The savings from the ultimately smaller class size — even after six recruits dropped out — influenced the allocation of $1.4 million for fiscal 2025 to hold another trooper academy.

Jones said the infrequency of academy training complicates recruiting efforts because it delays employment for otherwise strong candidates.

“There’s only so much loyalty someone can have if they don’t have a job, and they have to wait another three years,” Jones said.

Also an issue: Jones said roughly half of applicants fail the physical assessment needed to enter the trooper academy. And then there’s equity: Women and people of color have not typically pursued careers in law enforcement with the same gusto shown by white men.

“One of my responsibilities is community engagement,” said Jones, who regularly gives out his phone number to potential applicants. “Going in and talking to communities where there’s a higher percentage of minority members — who are interested — but yet are still under the perception that Rhode Island State Police is not something that is engaging, is welcoming.”

Jones has fortified recruitment efforts with outreach and educational events. The State Police also participate in mentorship programs like the youth-focused nonprofit MENTOR Rhode Island to help demystify the job by visiting and engaging with young people at places like Boys & Girls Clubs .

Members of the State Police also play basketball with Providence kids in the We Got Next Basketball league.

“When we are speaking with young men and women of color, in particular, we want to be those role models,” Jone said. “One of the reasons why I applied is I saw a trooper of color.”

Recruitment pressures mirror national trend

Jones’ job involves changing perception — not the easiest task, perhaps, when you’re fostering goodwill toward a paramilitary organization.

But the Rhode Island State Police are not alone in their recruiting difficulties. The city of Seattle will lose more officers than it will hire, KOMO News reported recently . In Maryland, the state’s largest police department in Baltimore had 235 vacancies in its 1,900-member force as of May. And in neighboring Massachusetts , about 46% of the State Police academy recruitments dropped out within their first two weeks.

Jones is careful not to sanitize the hardship behind being — and becoming — a state trooper.

“It is a very challenging profession. I’m not gonna try to candy coat that at all,” he said.

Free fitness evaluations enlighten potential applicants to the academy’s physical demands, Jones said. The battery of tests includes sit-ups, push-ups and a 300 meter run, with a recruit’s gender and age determining the intensity of the test. Male recruits aged 18-29 must be able to complete 40 sit-ups and 33 push-ups in a minute; men aged 30-35 have to finish 36 sit-ups and 27 push-ups in a minute. Female recruits under 30 must finish 35 sit-ups and 18 push-ups in a minute; those 30-35 must do 27 sit-ups and 14 push-ups.

Those are just the physical barriers to becoming a State Police trooper. Nearly a decade of anti-police protests offer another roadblock in the form of public feelings about law enforcement. Remarkably, public faith in the police was still higher than numerous institutions in a 2023 Gallup poll — only small businesses and the military saw higher rates of public approval than police. Only 43% of the survey’s respondents said they had “quite a lot” of confidence in police.

“The Rhode Island State Police tradition is always dignity and respect and ‘Treat everyone the same,’” Jones said. “But it wasn’t until late 2000s when community outreach was something that we really truly started to get involved in.”

A tiny, but diverse, State Police

Rhode Island State Police, led by Col. Darnell S. Weaver, a Black man, has done well for its size when it comes to diversity in the ranks. Weaver’s predecessor from 2016 to 2019 , was Col. Ann C. Assumpico, the first woman to hold that post. The graduating academy class in 2019 included seven women, a record, as well as eight Black troopers and six Hispanic troopers.

Asked for records on the gender and race demographics of the New Hampshire State Police, Lt. Alexander J. Davis replied that there weren’t “any records that are responsive to [that] request.”

The Vermont State Police did not have agency-wide data, said Adam Silverman, a police spokesperson. But the most recent troopers who graduated from the Vermont Police Academy consisted of three men and one woman — “ all white, non-Hispanic,” Silverman wrote.

The Massachusetts State Police, according to the commonwealth’s diversity dashboard, had 2,326 sworn officers in the fourth quarter of fiscal 2024. Of those officers, 7.7% (180) were women, 8.6% (200) were Hispanic and 6.7% (157) were Black.

Rhode Island won’t reach those numbers, but it is trying hard to fill those precious academy slots. The State Police will hold a recruitment open house Saturday, July 20, from 10 a.m.- 2 p.m. at its Scituate headquarters, 311 Danielson Pike in North Scituate.

“What I want to do is encourage any potential applicants of color that we do have troopers on our job that look like you and come from the same background,” Jones said.

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