During their careers, most law enforcement officers will have multiple contacts with individuals with behavioral health conditions (including mental health conditions and sub-stance use disorders) or intellectual and developmental disabilities (IDD).

Officers may experience various challenges when responding to situations involving individuals with these conditions or disabilities. Crisis Response and Intervention Training (CRIT) enhances the ability of officers to effectively address these challenges.

CRIT is a 40-hour training curriculum, including 10 hours of hands-on, scenario-based skills training, that prepares police officers to respond to people in crisis related to behavioral health conditions or IDD. CRIT is based upon the Memphis Crisis Intervention Team (CIT) training and is designed to complement the development and delivery of crisis response programs planned by law enforcement agencies, behavioral health service providers, and disability service providers in the community. CRIT is also designed to support law enforcement agencies’ implementation of various types of crisis response models, which may or may not include CIT programs. Model examples include mobile response, co-responder teams, and community response.

Throughout the CRIT curriculum, the safety of officers and the community is emphasized. The goals of the curriculum include

• • expanding officers’ knowledge of mental health conditions, substance use disorders, and IDD;
  • emphasizing the de-escalation of crisis situations;
  • supporting officer safety and wellness;
  • enhancing officers’ awareness of community-based services; and
  • creating connections with people with lived experience.

Supported by the Office of Justice Programs, Bureau of Justice Assistance, the Academic Training to Inform Police Reponses Initiative—a collaborative partnership among the IACP, University of Cincinnati, Policy Research Associates, The Arc – United States’ National Center on Criminal Justice and Disability, and the National Policing Institute—developed CRIT by utilizing researchers and subject matter experts in law enforcement, crisis response, behavioral health, and disabilities. The training content sourced information from U.S. statistics, research findings, and best practices for crisis response. CRIT was piloted with four law enforcement agencies in 2022: the Corvallis, Oregon, Police Department; the Rapid City, South Dakota, Police Department; the Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, Bureau of Police; and the Shreveport, Louisiana, Police Department. The feedback from these pilot deliveries, including feedback from participants and local trainers, was used to further enhance curriculum materials.

This free, off-the-shelf training curriculum includes 18 customizable modules of various lengths for multiple learning styles. CRIT provides a toolkit of resources to support the coordination and delivery of the training in police agencies, including an Instructor Guide, a Participant Guide, evaluation and trainer materials and resources, and PowerPoint presentations for each module. The CRIT curriculum is available at www.informedpoliceresponses.com/crit-toolkit. d

Please cite as

Rachel H. Jensen and Dana Bonnell, “The Next Generation of Crisis Response Training,” IACP@Work, Police Chief 90, no. 6 (June 2023): 68.