High-tech Simulator Gives Criminal Justice Students Next-Level Training

A newly acquired simulator, not often used at the university level, gives Radford University criminal justice students training on how best to react to hostile situations they may encounter as police officers in the future.

Criminal Justice faculty members Eric Snow and Roberto Santos run the MILO Range simulator, commonly used by police departments, to involve students in various scenarios that force the students to respond to a multitude of situations. “We’re able to put students into a scenario and have them make those split-second decisions on what level of force may be justified,” Snow said. “They have also found that verbal de-escalation, in a lot of cases, will work.”

Students respond to the simulations with their voices and actions, which can involve artificial weapons. The professor in charge of the system is in control of how the simulation responds to the students’ decisions.

The scenarios aim to put participants through positive threat identification. During some simulations, students will have to make split-second decisions on who is or isn’t a threat. To further increase the realism of the scenario, Snow and Santos are able to make their own simulations in the MILO system.

In addition to using this technology in criminal justice classes, the Radford University Police Department uses the MILO System to train its officers.