Getting Started with Your Culminating Project
The following is an example that walks you through a process for building the proposal for your
culminating project.
Background: According to Wikipedia, Chippewa County, Wisconsin has a population of 64,000 people.
The Chippewa County Sheriff Department serves the Chippewa Falls, Wisconsin area. This area of
Wisconsin is best known for being the home of Leinenkugel’s brewery. It is also the home of Seymour
Cray the “father of supercomputing” who created Cray Research. Chippewa Falls is 15 miles from the
annual four-day music festivals Country Fest and Rock Fest. These rock festivals draw in 50,000 fans
each year and are being branded as the nation’s premier outdoor rock venue.
Scenario (Fictitious) – Let’s assume that recently, the local TV station reported that violent crime in
Chippewa County has shot up 224% in the last ten years. Social media sites then cascaded this report to
the citizens of northwestern Wisconsin. The mayor of Chippewa Falls asked the Sheriff to explain what
was going on with crime. Why the big increase? The organizers for the two rock festivals also expressed
alarm that this news would hurt future attendance at the concerts.
Also assume that you are a deputy in this department and you have been asked by the Sheriff to:
1) Identify the reason for the increased crime rate and show real data to explain the issue.
2) Propose a crime analysis unit to address the issue.
3) Design the crime analysis unit. What other departments/organizations will need to be included?
How will you get them to support this crime unit?
4) Identify ways to fund the unit.
5) Estimate the time it will take to staff the unit.
Step 1: Find the data:
1. Go to https://www.bjs.gov/ucrdata/Search/Crime/Local/JurisbyJuris.cfm
a. Choose state “Wisconsin”
b. Choose population group “MSA counties from 25,000 thru 99,999”
c. Click on “Next”
2. Then go to the crime reporting by city
(https://www.bjs.gov/ucrdata/Search/Crime/Local/RunCrimeJurisbyJuris.cfm)
a. Choose an agency “Chippewa County Sheriff Department”
b. Choose “Number of violent crimes”
c. Choose years “1985” to “2014”(or latest reported year)
d. Click on “Get Table”
3. Select Spreadsheet of this table on the top of the page to create a .csv file to use with MS Excel.
4. Open the .csv file with MS Excel.
5. Graph the information to show trends and format as necessary. For example, the following
graph was created showing the last 10 years of reported data on violent crime.
6. Save the work as an .xslx (Excel format) and not .csv file.
Step 2: Determine the reason for the increased crime rate:
1. After analyzing the information, the TV report was correct. In 2004, there were 17 violent crimes
committed. In 2014, there were 38 violent crimes committed (a 224% increase). The aggravated
assault shot up in 2010, but had been going down. Then there was an uptick in 2014.
2. In December 2011, the UCR Program changed its definition of rape from “Forcible Rape” to
“Penetration, no matter how slight, of the vagina or anus with any body part or object, or oral
penetration by a sex organ of another person, without the consent of the victim.” The new
definition of rape is now including more incidents.
3. You will propose that a crime analysis unit be created to address the increasing number of rapes
in the county.
Step 3: Design the crime analysis unit:
1. Goals for the unit:
a. Through outreach into the community, increase understanding. Identify the best
sources to use for this outreach. This might include TV, newspaper, social media,
community presentations.
b. Analyze the most frequent times, locations, and events of the reported rapes to
determine when and where to send police. Use Evidence-Based Policing practices to
increase the efficiency and effectiveness of the initiatives.
c. See a reduction in the number of rapes.
2. What other departments/organizations will need to be included?
a. Police Chief
b. Field Operation Department
c. Investigations Department
d. State Patrol
e. School Resource Officer
f. High School
g. Junior College
h. Local bars
i. Local churches
j. Country Fest and Rock Fest organizations
3. How will you get them to support this crime unit?
a. Convince everyone that having a save community is great for business and they need to
work to keep it safe.
Step 4: Identify ways to fund the unit.
1. Hopefully, the cost of establishing this unit will be offset by volunteers. For additional funding,
consider:
a. Asking Mayor
b. Asking local business community
c. Ask City Council
d. Create a DOJ grant
e. Create a grant to a private foundation
2. Volunteers
a. Work with local high school and college students to assist with outreach.
b. Work with colleges to create internships programs for credit.
3. Think outside the box to reduce cost and show improvements. Here’s an example that relates to
drug usage: What if your community is experiencing people doing drugs in a park at 2 am. How
would you solve the issue? You come up with expensive solutions but sometimes it is as easy as
having sprinklers go off every ten minutes.
Step 5: Estimate the time it will take to staff the unit.
1. 3-6 months
2. Milestones
a. Find funding source.
b. Sheriff sends memo to the prospective members asking for their support and
attendance at an info session about the team.
c. Team members talk with their supervisors to get approvals and allocation of the time
that they can spend on the new crime initiative.
d. Team kickoff
Supporting information
As discussed in this module. NCVS data included reported and unreported crimes, and has a great deal
of information on each crime. NCVS can be used to better understand rape statistics, however, NCVS
doesn’t provide a county or city view of the data, so we can’t use it to explain what was happening in
Chippewa County. We can us the data to understand the issue of rape in the Midwest. The following
charts are created by doing a NCVS search looking at Rape, in the Midwest, in population less than 100k.
0
20
40
60
80
100
120
140
NCVS 1995-2016 Rape-Pop less than 100k, Midwest
The NCVS data could be useful to the crime unit as they plan strategies for reducing rape in the area.Getting Started with Your Culminating Project
The following is an example that walks you through a process for building the proposal for your
culminating project.
Background: According to Wikipedia, Chippewa County, Wisconsin has a population of 64,000 people.
The Chippewa County Sheriff Department serves the Chippewa Falls, Wisconsin area. This area of
Wisconsin is best known for being the home of Leinenkugel’s brewery. It is also the home of Seymour
Cray the “father of supercomputing” who created Cray Research. Chippewa Falls is 15 miles from the
annual four-day music festivals Country Fest and Rock Fest. These rock festivals draw in 50,000 fans
each year and are being branded as the nation’s premier outdoor rock venue.
Scenario (Fictitious) – Let’s assume that recently, the local TV station reported that violent crime in
Chippewa County has shot up 224% in the last ten years. Social media sites then cascaded this report to
the citizens of northwestern Wisconsin. The mayor of Chippewa Falls asked the Sheriff to explain what
was going on with crime. Why the big increase? The organizers for the two rock festivals also expressed
alarm that this news would hurt future attendance at the concerts.
Also assume that you are a deputy in this department and you have been asked by the Sheriff to:
1) Identify the reason for the increased crime rate and show real data to explain the issue.
2) Propose a crime analysis unit to address the issue.
3) Design the crime analysis unit. What other departments/organizations will need to be included?
How will you get them to support this crime unit?
4) Identify ways to fund the unit.
5) Estimate the time it will take to staff the unit.
Step 1: Find the data:
1. Go to https://www.bjs.gov/ucrdata/Search/Crime/Local/JurisbyJuris.cfm
a. Choose state “Wisconsin”
b. Choose population group “MSA counties from 25,000 thru 99,999”
c. Click on “Next”
2. Then go to the crime reporting by city
(https://www.bjs.gov/ucrdata/Search/Crime/Local/RunCrimeJurisbyJuris.cfm)
a. Choose an agency “Chippewa County Sheriff Department”
b. Choose “Number of violent crimes”
c. Choose years “1985” to “2014”(or latest reported year)
d. Click on “Get Table”
3. Select Spreadsheet of this table on the top of the page to create a .csv file to use with MS Excel.
4. Open the .csv file with MS Excel.
5. Graph the information to show trends and format as necessary. For example, the following
graph was created showing the last 10 years of reported data on violent crime.
6. Save the work as an .xslx (Excel format) and not .csv file.
Step 2: Determine the reason for the increased crime rate:
1. After analyzing the information, the TV report was correct. In 2004, there were 17 violent crimes
committed. In 2014, there were 38 violent crimes committed (a 224% increase). The aggravated
assault shot up in 2010, but had been going down. Then there was an uptick in 2014.
2. In December 2011, the UCR Program changed its definition of rape from “Forcible Rape” to
“Penetration, no matter how slight, of the vagina or anus with any body part or object, or oral
penetration by a sex organ of another person, without the consent of the victim.” The new
definition of rape is now including more incidents.
3. You will propose that a crime analysis unit be created to address the increasing number of rapes
in the county.
Step 3: Design the crime analysis unit:
1. Goals for the unit:
a. Through outreach into the community, increase understanding. Identify the best
sources to use for this outreach. This might include TV, newspaper, social media,
community presentations.
b. Analyze the most frequent times, locations, and events of the reported rapes to
determine when and where to send police. Use Evidence-Based Policing practices to
increase the efficiency and effectiveness of the initiatives.
c. See a reduction in the number of rapes.
2. What other departments/organizations will need to be included?
a. Police Chief
b. Field Operation Department
c. Investigations Department
d. State Patrol
e. School Resource Officer
f. High School
g. Junior College
h. Local bars
i. Local churches
j. Country Fest and Rock Fest organizations
3. How will you get them to support this crime unit?
a. Convince everyone that having a save community is great for business and they need to
work to keep it safe.
Step 4: Identify ways to fund the unit.
1. Hopefully, the cost of establishing this unit will be offset by volunteers. For additional funding,
consider:
a. Asking Mayor
b. Asking local business community
c. Ask City Council
d. Create a DOJ grant
e. Create a grant to a private foundation
2. Volunteers
a. Work with local high school and college students to assist with outreach.
b. Work with colleges to create internships programs for credit.
3. Think outside the box to reduce cost and show improvements. Here’s an example that relates to
drug usage: What if your community is experiencing people doing drugs in a park at 2 am. How
would you solve the issue? You come up with expensive solutions but sometimes it is as easy as
having sprinklers go off every ten minutes.
Step 5: Estimate the time it will take to staff the unit.
1. 3-6 months
2. Milestones
a. Find funding source.
b. Sheriff sends memo to the prospective members asking for their support and
attendance at an info session about the team.
c. Team members talk with their supervisors to get approvals and allocation of the time
that they can spend on the new crime initiative.
d. Team kickoff
Supporting information
As discussed in this module. NCVS data included reported and unreported crimes, and has a great deal
of information on each crime. NCVS can be used to better understand rape statistics, however, NCVS
doesn’t provide a county or city view of the data, so we can’t use it to explain what was happening in
Chippewa County. We can us the data to understand the issue of rape in the Midwest. The following
charts are created by doing a NCVS search looking at Rape, in the Midwest, in population less than 100k.
0
20
40
60
80
100
120
140