West Earl Township Police Officer Jake Waltz’ short three years on the force have already confirmed he made the right career decision.

Waltz began his college days as an occupational therapy major at Alvernia University in Berks County before switching to criminal justice, which he took a deep interest in.

“I knew I wanted to work with people,” Waltz said. “And I can’t sit behind a desk all day. Every day is different and that’s one of the things they talked about in my criminal justice courses in college. That sounded interesting, but at the Police Academy we learned what really goes on. I was still up in the air, but once I got into the academy it solidified what I wanted to do.”

Part of Waltz’ curriculum allowed him to go to the Police Academy for a semester during his junior year at Alvernia, for which he got full credit for. He still had a full year of classes before graduation, at which time he could start applying to become a police officer.

“Initially I had no idea what I wanted to do after high school,” he said. “I was either going to enlist or be an officer in the military. My parents wanted me to try college out for a year and I majored in occupational therapy. It just wasn’t for me. I started taking criminal justice classes and it was very interesting to me. Once I went to the academy, I realized there was nothing else I wanted to do other than become a police officer.”

Waltz graduated with a degree in criminal justice in 2019. He went to the academy with one of his Alvernia roommates who ended up getting a police job at Millersville University. Waltz applied, was hired and briefly worked with a previous Lancaster Law Enforcement participant in Lieutenant Art White.

After about a year with Millersville University PD, Waltz got a part-time job at West Earl Township Police Department that eventually turned into a full-time position. He’s been there for the past two years.

He’s still learning the ropes of being a full-time officer and enjoys making the most of every training opportunity he attends. He met West Earl Township Police Chief Eric Higgins at one of those courses which motivated him to apply to the department. A variety of topics interest Waltz and he’s been to search and seizure, DUI caselaw, and traffic safety trainings recently.

“Being a K9 Officer is something I’m interested in down the line,” he said. “I’ve only being doing this for three years, so once I get a good footing and I’m comfortable with everything that’s something I’d like to pursue.”

Waltz acknowledged certain misconceptions of police officers exist but has seen the opposite in his short time in the field.

“A lot of people just kind of characterize us all as bad people out to do them wrong,” he said. “That’s completely wrong. There are so many more good officers than bad. It just takes a few bad officers to make us all look bad. I'd say the correction is that most of us are good people. We're here to help them.”

Waltz said he’s recently picked up golf and plays video games to clear his mind after a rough day at work. He stays active outside of work by going to the gym and playing ice hockey, which he played on a club team at Alvernia, to help keep both his mental and physical health in check.

He still thinks the positives outweigh the negatives of the profession – even if days can sometimes be hard – and would recommend it to those who want to get in for the right reasons.

“We have a lot of power in our jobs,” he said. “And if you get in for the wrong reasons, you're going to come to work angry. You're going to take that out on people. Just make sure this is what you want to do before you do it. Do ride-a-longs, make sure you've checked every box that this is what you want to do because this is a stressful job. It can go bad easily. A lot of times people that really don't want to be at work are the ones that cause issues.”

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MEDIA CONTACT: Sean McBryan, semcbryan@co.lancaster.pa.us; Twitter: @SeanMcBryanLanc.