June is graduation month, when seniors put on their mortarboards and wave farewell to the campus.

One group of graduates is rather special. Besides having earned four-year college degrees, they possess marksman skills and training in wrestling or judo; that they all have automobile and motorcycle driver's licenses goes without saying.

The Central Police College is located at Kueishan, Taoyuan County, in northern Taiwan. The remote location does not make for instant recognition by outsiders. "If they have any idea of where we are at all, they think we're in Chingmei," sighed one third-year student. Chingmei, a suburb of Taipei, is home to the Taiwan Police Academy.

Both schools recruit high school graduates, but they differ in their objectives. The Central Police College offers a full four-year curriculum to train future police officers, while the academy produces basic level policemen after one or two years of training.

Competition for admission to the college is intense. Just over 200 of the four or five thousand candidates who apply each year are accepted, or an acceptance rate of about five percent; of the thousand or so women applicants, only around twenty are admitted--just two or three percent. To be accepted, candidates must pass both a written test and a physical examination.

Around seventy percent of the freshmen at the college have also passed the joint university entrance exams. As to why they select the Police College instead of a national university, one upperclassman makes a quite matter-of-fact analysis: "There are usually two attitudes. The first, of course, is the desire to be a policeman, to do good and to right wrong. Some more pragmatic considerations may figure in also: Your education here is paid for, and you don't need to worry about finding work in the future."

When freshmen at most colleges are attending welcoming receptions and mixers, the "future police officers" are training under the hot sun.

The women train right on campus. Besides swimming, shooting, and calisthenics, they also learn cooking, sewing, and flower arranging. It makes for a full day. "You're so tired you fall asleep as soon as your head hits the pillow, and you're so tanned you don't even recognize yourself," one senior coed recalls.

The men are trained at the Chinese Military Academy in Fengshan, near Kaohsiung. After three months of tough military training, they return to the college, where they continue to follow a disciplined regimen, wearing uniforms, performing routine chores, attending morning flag- raising ceremonies, being present for evening roll call, and the like.

Sensitivity and communication are emphasized besides discipline. To help the students to get to know each other better, roommates are reassigned each semester and tablemates in the cafeteria switched each month. Each semester, the students are required to participate in a "recognition contest" in which they compete by trying to state each student's name, background, habits, and hobbies in as much detail as they can.

Communication with teachers and staff workers is also encouraged. This February, for instance, the seniors held a seminar to make recommendations to the school for improvements in seven different areas. Not only were their recommendations welcomed by the administration, but the representatives who participated in the seminar were each commended.

The high image that police officers enjoy in the ROC today is the result of steady advances made by the nation in police education over the years.

The Central Police College was founded in 1936 when the government combined several existing police educational institutions into a new school with Chiang Kai-shek as president. At that time, the college was located in Nanking and offered a two-year program. In 1950, after the government moved to Taiwan, the college was temporarily closed, but it reopened in Taipei in 1954. A four-year program was instituted in 1957, and the school moved to Kueishan in 1977.

The Central Police College currently has nine departments: police administration, forensic science, public security, crime prevention and corrections, census, fire control, traffic science, foreign affairs, and conscription administration. There is also a two-year program for graduates of the Taiwan Police Academy and for police sergeants with excellent records, and a graduate school for police administration.

Most alumni of the college enter the police force after graduation, but a number have been successful in other fields also. Famous alumni of the school include Huang Tzuen-chiou, President of the Control Yuan; Lee Huan, Minister of Education; Mei Ko-wang, president of Tunghai University; Lin Shan-t'ien, director of the graduate school of law at Chengchi University; and Chao Shou-po, director of the Kuomintang's Department of Social Affairs. Besides the government and academia, many other graduates work in law or foreign affairs.

Because of broad scope of problems encountered in police work, students are trained in a wide range of subjects. Majors in police administration, for example, must study sociology, psychology, and economics in addition to law and the theory of police administration. Upon graduation, all students receive a bachelor of law degree (except for traffic science and fire control majors, who receive an engineering degree).

Despite the heavy course load, many of the students put their knowledge to work during vacations by offering voluntary juvenile counseling or community service. In addition, various departments and student bodies conduct camps during summer and winter vacation for middle school students in Taoyuan area.

To enable the students further to combine theory with practice and "step out of the ivory tower," all students are required to work as police trainees during the summer vacations of their second and third years.

After graduation, the students are assigned jobs by the Ministry of the Interior, the National Security Bureau, and the Ministry of Justice. Because their educational expenses are paid for by the government, students must complete six years of service after graduation.

Since police work is so demanding and dangerous, it is difficult for many women to accept being a policeman's wife. As a result, male students at the college often hope to find a future spouse among those close at hand: around two-thirds of the female students marry "within the family."

Police officers need quiet support behind them, be it their wife, their parents, or society at large.

[Picture Caption]

A police officer rescuing a little girl symbolizes the college's spirit of serving the people. The sculpture is by Chu Ming.

A student practices using a composite face machine, one of the tools of detective work.

A course that most colleges lack: how to take fingerprints.

Judo class, held four hours every week, forges strength and stamina.

Using a gun is one of the students' specialities. Shooting fpractice requires concentration.

Coeds at the college hold a charity sale in celebration of Women's Day.

(Above) Students practice calligraphy in their spare time to cultivate character.

(Below) Chou Shih-pin, a former president of the college, chats with students in the student center.

A student practices using a composite face machine, one of the tools of detective work.

A course that most colleges lack: how to take fingerprints.

Judo class, held four hours every week, forges strength and stamina.

Using a gun is one of the students' specialities.

Shooting fpractice requires concentration.

Coeds at the college hold a charity sale in celebration of Women's Day.

（Above） Students practice calligraphy in their spare time to cultivate character.

（Below） Chou Shih-pin, a former president of the college, chats with students in the student center.