Looking from the outside in, for some, it may look like agony. For those who remember being yelled at in basic training when donning protective gear, they may be jolted back to those “fond” memories. But this isn’t just basic training of any kind. It’s an intensive school with a high attrition rate. This is training for deputies who want to expand their tactical and emergency response skills to become SERT operators. This is the Sheriff’s Emergency Response Team (SERT) Basic school where 10 prospects began their training early on the morning of June 8 at the Lorton Urban Search and Rescue Training Center in Lorton, Va.
However, before falling into formation that first morning, the prospects were physically tested before day one even started. Just to get to that first day of SERT school, the prospects had to pass an interview panel as well as complete a physical fitness and agility test. Ten of the initial 17 interested deputies would make it to school Day One. Eight would make it all the way through five days of intense training and grueling motivation. Five days of new tactics. Five days of next-level bonding.
As brand-new lead instructors for the school, veteran members 2nd Lt. Daryl Shifflett and Master Deputy Sheriff Nick Barb put in the long hours from start to finish. Though new to the role of lead instructor, the two bring about three decades of combined team experience to their new roles.
“It’s early days and late nights,” Barb said. “The prospects receive high-level training, long hours. [Shifflett and I] make sure everything moves seamlessly and without delay so that we can move from one training objective to the next.”
While the training is designed to be difficult with physical fitness, intense learning, and purposeful stress, the weather helped the instructors add reality to the situation.
“We had a lot of weather-related challenges during the week,” Shifflett said. “A few days we had temperatures above 90 degrees, and other days we experienced severe thunderstorms and downpours.”
The elements provided the perfect opportunity for the prospects to train in conditions they may be responding to when activated in the future.
“It may not be a comfortable 70 degrees when we get called up,” Barb said. “When we train how we respond, we are prepared for any situation we could potentially face. Learning to be comfortable with the uncomfortable.”
Even though the entire team – team leaders, veteran operators, and prospects – stayed out in the rain for intense physical fitness drills, when the weather crashed and lit up the sky, the lead instructors adapted and switched up the schedule. Shifflett mentioned they’d brought everyone inside for classroom work until the weather passed. Then back outside to the PT drills.
Through the five days of training, the prospects learned the tactics of responding to an emergency either in the Adult Detention Center (ADC), the courthouse, or in the community.
“This is an opportunity for the prospects to grow in their career,” Barb said. “During this training they learn and become highly skilled in emergency operations and provide resources to emergencies that may rise in the course of our duties.”
Their training included learning how to respond as a team to a possible non-compliant inmate in the ADC or in a joint response environment with operators from other agencies during a civil disturbance. The schedule is not easy. There’s a lot to learn and to demonstrate. It is very physically and mentally challenging for those who are able to stay with it.
By the fourth day, the 10 prospects became eight.
“It’s hard losing prospects, that’s not the point of this training,” Shifflett said. “However, we did inform of them that we expect them to try again. Take some time to polish their skills and come back. Sometimes it takes a couple of tries to make it through. Even for the best operators.”
Finally, Friday afternoon arrived and the eight graduates were all exhausted smiles. Each received their green SERT hat and shirt and of course the coveted SERT pin designating them a member of the team.
When asked why being a SERT operator was so important to them, Barb said the training he’s received on SERT has made him a better deputy. But, he said, it goes beyond that.
“It’s opened so much for me. It’s given me an opportunity to grow, the opportunity to excel, the opportunity be better wholistically.”
“This is a brotherhood,” Shifflett said. “The team is what makes me happy to come to work every day. I’ve got a team of guys that I know will stand toe-to-toe with me in any situation.”
Now the school is over, the instructors are preparing the new members for their next steps: more training.
Congratulations to the new SERT members:
- MDS Manuel Gonzalez Castro
- MDS Keyon Wade
- Deputy Don Demarco Jones
- Deputy Oluwatimilehin Ogunlana
- Deputy Amin Salah
- Deputy Sajan Singh
- Deputy Michael Treminio
- Deputy Charles Wenner
Watch the video here.
