Dan

I finished with the Police Cadets in March 2016; shortly after I finished the cadets I also finished college, I then went to work for The North Face at their store in Cheshire Oaks while I decided what I wanted my future ‘career’ to be. After 14 months there I decided that wasn’t for me, and after a brief conversation with somebody working for G4S they said ‘look at what jobs G4S have, they always have loads of jobs going’. So I did, the only job they had was in Altcourse Prison! I applied to join the prison service and started as a Prison Custody Officer at HMP Altcourse, Fazakerley in January 2018. I then left the prison as I was offered a job with Merseyside Fire and Rescue Service as a Fire Fighter. In January 2019 I started that job and I’m currently a whole time operational Fire Fighter working out of Kirkdale Fire Station, Bootle. 

In addition to that I started working for a company called Manone Medical in December 2019 as an Ambulance Case Assistant, providing support with the patient transport side of NWAS. In May 2020 I started with a company called IMT working on their secure mental health ambulances, which provided nationwide secure transfers. In July of this year I moved companies to Spark Medical, where I am currently an Emergency Care Assistant working on frontline ambulances responding to mainly category 3 and 4, 999 calls, occasionally category 2. 

The prison, fire and ambulance services were never part of my working plans, but they’ve all been and are amazingly interesting and rewarding jobs. From a young age I’ve always wanted to join Merseyside Police, and that probably still is my ultimate goal, if not as a full time Constable then definitely as a Special Constable. That is why I was interested in the Police Cadets program, it gave me a more detailed insight into the different departments and roles within Merseyside Police. 

The Police cadets benefitted me massively, it helped me see how an emergency service works on a day to day basis. The opportunities the cadets provided were brilliant, I do regret not making the most of the opportunities, at times I felt I didn’t get as involved as I would’ve wanted, or as I would now. I feel the cadets helped me  grow some confidence and I felt more confident engaging in different groups as time went on, I feel if I was to do the cadets again now I would benefit from it a lot more as I’m a more confident and stronger person than I was when I was with the cadets. Therefore, the advice I would give would be to take any opportunity that is offered and make the most of the program.