Photo By Master Sgt. Betty Squatrito-Martin | U.S. Army National Guard Col. Todd Patnesky, Division Chief National Guard Counterdrug...... read more read more
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FORT BELVOIR, Va.—The National Guard Counterdrug Program gathered senior analysts from across the nation for the first ever Senior Analyst Summit at Fort Belvoir, Virginia, Feb. 7-9.
More than 70 senior analysts attended the summit designed to provide a forum to network, to hear about the prevailing trends in the field, to learn best practices, and to learn how to mentor and develop their co-workers.
"The Senior Analyst Summit is a critical event, helping leaders, at all levels, have the tools necessary to be successful at the state and national level,” U.S. Army 1st Sgt. Donald Cooley, NGCDP criminal analysts noncommissioned officer in charge, said.
“Senior analysts are the backbone of the Counterdrug Program,” U.S. Army National Guard Maj. Mesha Cichon, National Guard Counterdrug Intelligence Branch chief, said. “NCOs make things happen—mentoring, guidance, and training—that comes second nature to them.”
Senior analysts serve as a liaison between National Guard Counterdrug Program’s Intelligence Branch at National Guard Bureau and state Counterdrug Programs regarding information and information sharing specific to criminal analysts. They are the point of contact for disseminating information to criminal analysts in the field, ensuring analysts are following regulations and policy, and ensuring information on required training and professional development is provided.
“We want to get our analysts as informed, educated and networked as possible, so they can carry the information forward,” Cichon said.
During the summit, analysts received briefings from the Office of National Drug Control Policy, the Drug Enforcement Administration, and the Financial Crimes Enforcement Network to name a few. Other briefers touched on topics such as: prevailing trends in digital forensics, emerging activities and threats, emerging technologies, best practices, training events, analyst management and leadership.
“Our focus is on management, resources, guidance memos, policy, training, agency partnerships and networking," Cooley said.
“Networking with fellow experienced analysts helped provide a new insight to issues that are being dealt with in other states,” an Oregon analyst said.
These Analysts will take the information presented at the Summit back to the nearly 900 analysts in the field who are working at multi-agency task forces, federal narcotics task forces and local narcotics task forces.
“I am going to take a lot of information back to Nevada and apply it to our program,” a Nevada analyst said.
“There is a great deal of information that I will try to incorporate into the development of my analysts and the CD [Counterdrug] Program,” a Connecticut analyst said.
If the number of hands raised, the questions asked, and the information shared are any indication, the Summit proved a huge success.
“It was an awesome experience and a great job by all,” a Delaware analyst said. “I hope this is the first SAS of many.”
“The Program is growing because our analysts are awesome,” Cichon said.
| Date Taken: | 02.07.2017 |
| Date Posted: | 02.21.2017 12:36 |
| Story ID: | 224180 |
| Location: | FORT BELVOIR, VA, US |
| Web Views: | 175 |
| Downloads: | 0 |
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