The APCO Young Professionals Taskforce is proud to recognize Whitney Wilson as this quarter’s young professional. Wilson is a Senior Communications Officer serving the Roswell Police Department in Georgia. In November, the twenty-six-year-old will mark her fourth year as a dispatcher. During that time, she has added to her repertoire training recruits, assisting her shift supervisor and working as part of the North Fulton SWAT Crisis Negotiations Team.
Working at Roswell, Whitney especially loves the culture of teamwork. “I work with an amazing group of people in the center and the field responders. The entire center has a family atmosphere that makes it easy to come to work.” Not only has she learned about the industry, but she has also learned much about herself. “I bring a lot of passion for the job into my center,” she says, which “spills over into my work ethic. I never hesitate to help out when needed, and I’m always prepared to take on any task.”
Initially, Whitney was drawn to public safety by her father—who spent a combined thirty years serving in the military, then corrections, and finally with the Transportation Security Administration—and applied to dispatch in the Atlanta area when she completed her undergraduate studies in criminology.
Like many, Whitney saw dispatch as an opportunity to get her foot in the door and get an overall feel for what it is like to work in the industry. “There are not a lot of people who know that emergency communications is an actual career path” Whitney observes, “I do not think people have grasped how much 9-1-1 dispatching has evolved.” That reality informs her approach as she recruits other young professionals, many of whom Whitney finds are unfamiliar with the actual work of emergency communication, offering her assessment that, “Education is key.”
Now Whitney is driven to become a part of the next chapter. “I’ve learned so much about public safety working here, and I’ve learned a lot about myself. So I hope I can continue to learn…how I can be a part of the progression.”
Asked about turnover in our industry, Whitney attributes two main causes. First, a lack of support at a time when post-traumatic stress disorder in emergency communications is on the rise. According to Melissa Alterio, 9-1-1 Director for the City of Roswell Police, Whitney “has been instrumental” with the launch of a 9-1-1 Peer Support Network, and has “also created an educational session [for] the Fall Georgia Emergency Communications Conference.” When she completes her Masters in Clinical Mental Health Counseling with a concentration in trauma and crisis, Whitney hopes to shift her focus to counseling for first responders—a term in Georgia that includes emergency dispatchers.
A second contributor is a widespread lack of career development—she admits, perhaps at times due to funding shortages—and a real need to prepare leaders for related pathways in emergency management, technology, and peer support. “Young professionals are attracted to purpose and self-development,” Whitney says, “The incentives to attract more young professionals should focus on (1) creating career tracks to ensure advancement, and (2) providing training opportunities that assist with personal and professional development.”
For our young professional peers, Whitney also has some actionable advice: (1) Invest in your mental health and self-care, and (2) Do not get too comfortable, or take downtime for granted – always be willing to grow and stay focused. Finally, (3) Do not allow technology to become a “crutch” because “there have been times when technology fails, which could leave our generation in the dark.” Instead, (4) take time to learn from previous generations before they retire.
We agree with Director Alterio that Whitney Wilson truly “is a testament to young 9-1-1 professionals seeking to make a difference.”
