The College Voice

Media Credit: Dmitry Gurvits Professor of Criminal Justice and former Plainsboro Police Chief Elizabeth Bondurant

New Criminal Justice Professor Elizabeth Bondurant says of her previous job, "I really enjoyed being in patrol. I was pretty aggresive with my patrol tactics...I always liked to go out and make arrests...I wrote a lot of tickets." Bondurant started out in the patrol division of the Plainsboro Police Department. However, despite her bulletproof blue-eyed gaze, her spiked red hair, and the fact that she bench presses 205 pounds, Bondurant is more than just a retired cop.

A graduate of East Stroudsburg State University with a B.S. in Health and Education, Professor Bondurant has always envisioned herself as a teacher, saying she has now come full circle. Now in her first year as a full-time faculty member in the Criminal Justice department at Mercer, after teaching part-time for twelve years, Bondurant says, "I don't think there's a big transition between being a police officer and being a teacher, because you need to have good communication skills... you need to be able to handle people...yourself... [and] be self-motivated, if you're going to be good." She took that approach in her 25-year law enforcement career, and she's taking it now.

Bondurant retired from Plainsboro Police Department as Chief in 2008. She says of the experience: "it was a great job. I left at the top of my game...I feel like I really left a thumbprint."

Beginning on patrol in 1983, Bondurant felt she had to do "a little bit more to be accepted," she said, adding that people were "probably a little more disrespectful to [her] than they would a male officer." She was so tough, in fact, that she reports people said she'd "probably give [her] mother a ticket," and a fellow officer once described her saying she's "not by the book, she is the book", a reputation that she says she'll "take any day of the week".

Retired Lt. William Kugel, a colleague of Bondurant's for 24 years, said "she came in and she realized that she was in a role...that was dominated by men and I think she was out to prove herself and she was always a very hard worker."

After being promoted from street duty after eleven years -four as a patrolman and juvenile detective and seven as a sergeant- Bondurant did the work of two or even three people when she became a lieutenant, says Ret. Lt. Kugel. "She had a lot of responsibility on her hands and she did well with it," Kugel says.

In fact, when Bondurant was promoted to captain 10 years later, two people were bumped up to fill her old post. Her list of obligations, in addition to overseeing the day-to-day business of the 25 officers in her command, included teaching CPR, being the internal affairs investigator, teaching at the police academy and writing departmental policy. "It's definitely just as stressful, and weighs on you, as being on the road. It might even be more stressful," Bondurant says.

A major theme of her policing career was a focus on education. "I believe in the mission of the police agency, and I believe that a police officer should be professional at all times, and I believe that you need to lead by example. I can't expect people to want to further their education if I didn't do it myself. Education has always been important to me," Bondurant says.

"She came in and she realized that she was in a role...that was dominated by men and I think she was out to prove herself and she was always a very hard worker." -Ret. Lt. William Kugel

Even after entering law enforcement, which she did because teaching jobs weren't available, Bondurant worked rotating shifts in order to complete an M.A. in Criminal Justice from Jersey City University. On her own time, Bondurant began taking certified public management courses while still a sergeant, before she was sent by the department as part of her professional development once she was promoted to lieutenant.

In addition, Bondurant was trained as a blood-borne pathogen instructor. She also holds several certifications she obtained online, augmenting her professionally- mandated education. "I did all that on my own. So, I always felt like it was a growth process for me both professionally and personally. It was my career and I wanted to be the best I could be," she said.

Now that she's out of law enforcement, she feels she has the best of both worlds. "I have all the positives of my last job, and none of the negatives," Bondurant says, smiling.

Not content to simply teach, she's taking on responsibility at Mercer too. Already she's getting involved with Scott Lowe in the Fire Academy and Bryon Marshall in Security and working to create a Community Emergency Response Team (CERT) on campus.

Another goal she has is to create a volunteer credit for students who want to become CERT members. She hopes to "show [students] about volunteerism...and how to be better prepared in an emergency." These types of synergies are where she feels she'll be most effective, bringing together otherwise separate departments of the school. She says she would also like to use her experience with the Department of Homeland Security, where she worked for eight months after leaving policing, to create a Homeland Security and Emergency Management certificate or degree program. Calling them "big projects that will take time," Bondurant always has the future in mind.

Bondurant's ability to see the big picture, to set goals and then work steadily to achieve them, is one of the reasons she retired from her job as police chief after completing only half the time of her original contract. Her administrative team at the Plainsboro Police Deparment, Ret. Lt. Kugel, Lt. DeSimone, and current Chief Furda, were all close to possible retirement as well and she felt that staying would not lead the agency to the future. "By me leaving in 2008, that enabled a seasoned Lieutenant [Furda], somebody with 24, 25 years experience, to take over as chief and bring some of these younger guys, the supervisors, the sergeants, to the lieutenant position and mentor them and get them ready to take over," she said.

When asked why he thought Prof. Bondurant decided to step down early, Ret. Lt. Kugel said "Liz had a love for the job, and love for Plainsboro... why she didn't stay three years...I can only think it was because life is short and there's other places you can be."

"By being engaged and involved, you make things happen," says Bondurant. Despite the substantial goals she has set, she says she's quite happy. She has a boxer puppy that she's raising, or, she says, may be raising her, and she's looking forward to reading the next Malcolm Gladwell book and rooting for the Eagles. "I'm smiling," she says, adding, "now I just look at it as it's all good, it's all mentoring, helping these students."

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