A U.S. Army Military Information Support Operations team partnered with State Department and Salvadoran officials to increase young adult awareness of national police opportunities offered during a recruiting event Oct. 6, 2016 in El Salvador’s Morazan department.
For months the Special Operations Command South assigned MISO team, together with the International Narcotics and Law Enforcement Affairs bureau at the American embassy, helped partner nation counterparts assess communication efforts and offered best practices to strengthen police academy recruitment campaigns.
The Salvadoran education ministry institution leading the effort – known in Spanish as the “Instituto Especializado de Nivel Superior - Academia Nacional de Seguridad Publica,” or IES-ANSP – implemented those practices in hopes of improving the campaign’s communication strategy.
The IES-ANSP promotes national police career openings to give 18 and 19-year olds better schooling opportunities and a chance at a career, said Robert Sorsa, a U.S. Embassy INL advisor in the country’s capital of San Salvador.
“We are trying to raise the level of professionalism through education, training, and career development,” said Sorsa, who added that the assistance and support provided by the MISO team has been effective in getting that message out to potential recruits.
The team’s unique cultural knowledge and skillsets contributed in determining effective communication methods that enhanced IES-ANSP recruiting efforts, said Sorsa.
The IES-ANSP is hoping to attract those looking to serve their nation, while furthering their education as they enter the workforce, through a series of recruitment campaigns, said the IES-ANSP’s sub-director, police Commissioner Jose Manuel Olivares Rivera, during opening remarks at the event.
“The objective of these series of events is to communicate, through government efforts, with the youth of our community so they can get to know and understand that the [national police] and the IES-ANSP are institutions created to serve the populace and the country,” said Olivares. Beginning next year, the academy’s training will also function as a post-secondary education institution, he added.
Efforts to assist the IES-ANSP, which began last year by the INL, reinforce Salvadoran security institutions’ ability to undermine support for terrorist ideology and violent networks.
SOCSOUTH MISO operations, implemented with the approval of host nation U.S. ambassadors in accordance with U.S. Code, Defense department policy, and U.S. Southern Command instruction, are a vital part of a broader USSOUTHCOM and interagency effort against transnational criminal and violent extremist organizations.
The partner nation led collaboration with the MISO team and interagency far exceeded expectations, resulting in more than 200 candidates submitting recruitment applications.
It is rewarding to see how effective bringing in a different perspective can be, said a MISO team planner, noting that the recruitment campaign implemented social media platforms into their communication strategy based on ideas discussed while working together with their counterparts.
“We have a great relationship with the MISO team and hopefully we can continue working with them in the recruitment program,” said Sorsa.
The presence of MISO teams in countries like Colombia, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, Panama, Peru, Trinidad and Tobago, and among others in the USSOUTHCOM area of responsibility, continues to build on collaborate security efforts.
Such mutually beneficial efforts to integrate MISO and messaging into partner nations operations in the region include countering terrorism, the DoD Rewards Program, countering transnational organized crime, and security forces recruitment and professionalization.
Salvadoran event participants included the labor and social prevision ministry or “Ministerio de Trabajo y Prevision Social,” the Civil National Police or “PNC,” the Ministry of Governors, and the Morazan department officials or “Gobernacion Departamental de Morazán."