Law Enforcement UrbanGo: Mysterious Budapest – The Experiences of a Citybound Game in Law Enforcement Higher Education

Abstract

Law enforcement higher education faces several challenges in the past couple of years (new generation requirements, competence-based learning) that calls for the trial and incorporation of new methods into our courses. Experiential education, gamification and project pedagogy are methods used more and more often in modern pedagogy, even in higher education. The integration of new methods into the teaching process, the power and possible outcome of these is covered in several scientific articles focusing on teaching methodology3 (Csikósné, 2019, Mezeiová – Bencsik, 2019). This present study is about our take on experiential education and gamification at the Department of Behavioural Sciences and Law Enforcement at UPS: a citybound detective game which we called Mysterious Budapest, and planned for our 1st-year police students. Students were strolling around Budapest in 4-6-member groups looking for locations where significant crimes took place. The crimes were thematized so there were locations connected to organized crime, homicide, the dangers of police work, etc. Students not only had to find these places but, on their way, they had to solve different tasks to earn points. Group work started with the planning process as the groups had to collectively decide the itinerary and the tasks to be done. At the end of the day presentations were held on the collected information and challenges faced and solved. First-year students come to our courses following a 6-week-long basic training4 , where their physical endurance and their willingness to accept the rules of law enforcement (adhering to a strict daily schedule, obeying commands, accepting hierarchy) are on trial. After the rigid framework of the previous weeks, it is always exciting to see how students function in relative freedom. In the following pages we are summing up the experiences of this citybound game, reflecting on the ways of improvement and the possible positive outcomes of it in law enforcement higher education.