Utah’s Public Safety Commissioner Jess L. Anderson talks with faculty during a visit to Utah State University on March 27, 2024. (Photo credit: Simon Bergholtz)
By Andrea DeHaan, CHaSS Communications Editor
Utah State Department of Public Safety Commissioner Jess L. Anderson recently spent a day visiting with students and faculty at Utah State University.
Following invitations from USU’s Director of the Institute of Government and Politics (IOGP) Jennifer Seelig and the Criminal Justice program, Anderson spent most of March 27 discussing careers in law enforcement and reflecting on his journey from his hometown of Delta, Utah to his 2018 appointment as Utah’s Commissioner of Public Safety.
During his address to students and faculty, Anderson said the day had started with calls about homelessness and other public safety issues — what he termed “just some [of the] real-world demands.”
“When it comes to criminal justice, it's more than just police work,” he said, citing the need for experience with social issues. “They are a mental health coach. They are … the tip of the spear, the first responder, but also the ones … having to deal in so many different facets than just what used to be traditionally protective service. And so, we have to be innovative.”
The commissioner said he was grateful for USU’s vision and willingness “to engage … to help bring along … to [understand] the issues, the current affairs, … the demand[s] of what tomorrow is going to bring.”
Whatever tomorrow brings, Anderson sees education, internships, and mentoring as key to helping officers meet new challenges.
“When I came in as a commissioner in 2018, Governor Herbert had a '66% by 2020’ initiative,” Anderson said, referencing a campaign driven by the former governor’s Education Excellence Commission to raise the number of Utah adults earning a college degree or post-secondary certificate to 66 percent.
“I took that to heart, and I challenged our own department within the Department of Public Safety, 1600 employees, … to meet that same example,” he said. And today, “67 percent have a college education or certificate of some kind. It raises all levels of professionalism.”
While in Logan, Anderson met with university stakeholders interested in learning how USU might help the state equip even more students for high-demand fields. Anderson noted that there is a particular need for Utah Highway Patrol officers, and the university recently launched a four-year criminal justice degree.
Assistant Professor Stephen VanGeem said the events were not only valuable for learning about careers in law enforcement but also gave interested students a chance to meet with Commissioner Anderson in a lower-stakes setting.
“This is an opportunity for them to meet with a high-ranking official, but have it not be overwhelming. It's not within the confines of the state capitol or some grandiose office somewhere,” VanGeem said. “It's more that this is just a regular human being who lived their life and found themselves on this trajectory where they ended up in this position of prominence.”
Students and faculty spent time in conversation with Commissioner Anderson over lunch and an open house hosted by the IOGP. He made an effort to meet every person in the room and to answer questions before joining Assistant Professor Glen Haas and students in his CJ 1010: Introduction to Criminal Justice class later that afternoon. CJ 1010 is currently taught on the Logan campus but broadcast to students throughout the state.
Haas said participating students saw Anderson’s visit as imparting that anyone could rise to that position if they worked hard, and that one student said the commissioner’s meeting with the class “helped re-spark his interest in finishing his degree, because he has two years left at USU, and now, a career in the CJ field feels real.”
Students agreed that having Utah’s Commissioner of Public Safety come to the campus and their class was meaningful and “put a human face to that position.”
“It demonstrated the importance of the CJ program and the connection to the Utah DPS. They universally appreciated a visit by someone of his stature and what that meant to the university’s reputation,” Haas, a retired police commander, said.
Housed in the College of Humanities and Social Sciences, USU’s Criminal Justice program offers students a range of options in Logan, Price, Tooele, Blanding, and other statewide campuses, including criminal justice bachelor and associate degrees alongside Peace Officer Standards Training (POST) and certificate studies in the area of law and society.
The opportunity to hear directly from the top about the hiring process was an invaluable one for students at USU, particularly the advice that one shouldn’t wait to take on leadership roles.
One student in the class Anderson attended appreciated him discussing the Department of Public Safety’s priorities, direction, and emphasis. She felt he provided valuable information for students deciding which careers to pursue and shared insights about what the DPS looks for in a successful applicant.
"I like that he talked about what they want Utah to look like [in the future],” she said.
Maria Luisa Spicer-Escalante, a professor in the Department of World Languages and Cultures at Utah State University, is a recipient of a Fulbright Specialist Program Award for 2024-2027.
After an intense day of competition, the Utah State University Speech & Debate Team won the College Public Forum League National Championship. The championship took place virtually on May 4 and featured the country’s best novice college debate programs.
