Holland College

Course Details

(certificate) Correctional Officer

Course Description

Correctional Officers monitor, supervise and interact with incarcerated offenders to help offenders to become law-abiding citizens after serving their sentences. Correctional Officers ensure the safety and well-being of inmates within institutions. Responsibilities include supervising inmate movement, escorting inmates both inside and outside the institution, searching cells, offenders, visitors, vehicles, living units, and surrounding areas, extracting inmates from cells, and conducting security checks. Other Correctional Officer duties include verifying safety equipment, drafting daily logs, submitting reports, and briefing visitors, volunteers, and other criminal justice professionals entering the institution. (More information on Correctional Officers) The Correctional Officer program is specifically designed to provide students with the skills and knowledge required for a rewarding career as a Correctional Officer in Canadian correctional institutions. This intensive program includes training in: the duties and role of a Correctional Officer; excellent communications techniques; the role of corrections in the Canadian justice system; working as a valuable member of a team; principles of human relations, sociology and psychology; appropriate use of control tactics, firearms and other control devices. On the job training is an integral component of the Correctional Officer program. Students are placed in federal and provincial correctional facilities in the Atlantic region and across Canada to apply their newly-acquired knowledge and skills as a Correctional Officer. Please note: Students who intend to seek on-the-job training opportunities in the province of Nova Scotia will be required to purchase and wear Body Armor Level II Stab and Ballistic vests. The cost of this body armour is approximately $825. The Correctional Officer program is a mandatory residential program. Cadets are required to live in residence in single-person rooms for the duration of the training, excluding the on the job training component of the program. The residential environment serves as a training lab in the same way as the driving track and firing range do. The residence provides experiential learning that would not be possible if students interacted with one another in an instructional setting alone. Residence life allows students to develop skills in teamwork, problem solving, time management and communications, and allows for the development of gender and cross-cultural sensitivity, which are essential to a successful career in the policing community.

Course Duration

NumberDuration
24week

Career outcomes

Graduates from this program may find employment with: Federal & provincial correctional facilities.




(certificate) Correctional Officer Holland College