CJK0063 – Fundamentals of Patrol is a 40-hour course within Florida's 770-hour Law Enforcement Basic Recruit Training Program, carrying zero credit hours as a clock-hour academy component.
Patrol is where almost every Florida officer begins and where most spend their careers. This course teaches the working method of the job: how to organize a shift, respond to a call safely, approach a scene without creating an ambush, handle the routine contacts that make up most of the workload, and recognize when a routine situation has stopped being routine.
The organizing concept is officer safety — not as a slogan but as a set of habits. Positioning, cover and concealment, contact and cover roles when a second officer is present, approach angles on a building or vehicle, keeping hands visible, maintaining reactionary gap, and situational awareness are taught as procedures with reasons attached. Recruits also learn the discipline of communicating position and status so that help can find them.
Content covers patrol methods — directed and random patrol, observation, and area familiarity; call response — priority, approach, scene management, and clearing; building searches and alarm response; suspicious person and vehicle contacts; domestic disturbance response, one of the most dangerous and most common call types; crowd situations; and handling and transporting persons in custody.
The course is practical and scenario-driven. Much of the assessment is by demonstration rather than written examination.
The course is offered at approximately 20 Florida institutions, all of them state colleges operating criminal justice training centers or regional public safety academies: Chipola, College of Central Florida, College of the Florida Keys, Daytona State, Eastern Florida State, Florida Gateway, Florida State College at Jacksonville, Gulf Coast State, Hillsborough, Indian River State, Miami Dade, North Florida, Northwest Florida State, Palm Beach State, Pasco-Hernando, Pensacola State, Santa Fe, South Florida State, St. Johns River, and Seminole State.
The Law Enforcement Basic Recruit Training Program (LEBRTP) is a 770-hour academy required for certification as a sworn law enforcement officer under Chapter 943, Florida Statutes. The curriculum is written and maintained by the Criminal Justice Standards and Training Commission (CJSTC) through the Florida Department of Law Enforcement, so content is consistent statewide. The full sequence:
Every component is a clock-hour course carrying zero credit hours, and none counts toward an associate degree.
Completing this course does not certify anyone. Recruits must finish the full 770-hour academy, pass the State Officer Certification Examination (SOCE), and satisfy the employment and background requirements of Chapter 943, F.S. Certification is granted by CJSTC, not by the college, and an officer must also be employed by an agency to be certified.
Requirements attach to the academy rather than to this individual course: minimum age 19, U.S. citizenship, high school diploma or equivalent, no felony convictions or disqualifying misdemeanors, a background investigation, a physical examination and drug screening, and a passing score on the Florida Basic Abilities Test (CJBAT). Requirements are set in statute and by the training center.
Academy training is PSAV clock-hour instruction, not college credit, and does not transfer as general education. Many Florida colleges award block credit toward an A.S. in Criminal Justice Technology for full academy completion plus certification, under local articulation agreements rather than statewide SCNS equivalency. Confirm terms with the receiving institution.
Officers already certified in another discipline — corrections to law enforcement, for instance — complete abbreviated crossover programs drawing on a subset of these courses rather than the full academy. Candidates should work from the crossover curriculum published by their training center.
Unlike the Legal course, most of this material is assessed practically. Recruits are evaluated on whether they position themselves correctly, approach safely, and manage a scene — not on whether they can describe doing so. Students should expect scenario evaluation and, at many academies, remediation and retesting on specific skills.
Domestic calls are among the most frequent and most hazardous an officer handles, and Florida law imposes specific obligations — investigation, documentation, and a strong statutory preference for arrest of the primary aggressor where probable cause exists under Chapter 741. The tactical and legal content intersect here more than almost anywhere else in the academy, and this course covers the tactical half while CJK0018 covers the legal half.
Academy patrol training is a foundation, not a finished product. Every Florida agency runs a field training program after the academy — typically several months riding with a field training officer, under continuous evaluation, before an officer works alone. Recruits should understand that the academy qualifies them to begin field training, not to work independently.
Generated August 31, 2026 · Updated August 31, 2026