Typical Day for a Probation Officer

Duties of a Probation Officer

Knowing the typical day for a probation officer will help you decide if this is the right career move for you.

Although not every probation officer is going to have the same exact tasks, understanding the duties of a probation officer will give you the best possible insight into a "typical day."

But before we talk about these duties, let's cover a bit about this exciting profession itself.

Many schools are now offering bachelor degrees and programs for men and women who want to become probation officers. This is not surprising because this job is in such great demand.

In fact, according to the highly acclaimed book "Best Jobs for the 21st Century," probation officers rank an incredible #132 out of "the 500 Best Jobs Overall." This impressive ranking is derived by considering a combination of factors, including: annual earnings, percent growth, annual openings.

Here are the numbers:

  • Annual Earnings: $38,780
  • Percent Growth: 23.8%
  • Annual Openings: 14,000

Typical Day for a Probation Officer

OK, let's discuss what a typical day for a probation officer may be like.

The following are the duties of a probation officer: helping to rehabilite law breakers and offenders who are on probation, on parole, in custody; formulate recommendations for such rehabilitation, which may include such things as education, treatment options, conditional release, etc; offering counseling to law offenders, and referring offenders to social services; speaking with offender's family regarding problems and needs; dealing with judges and attorneys regarding inmate's progress (or lack thereof); maintaining paperwork and case folders on offenders; interviewing offenders in an attempt to understand needs, issues, problems, attitude; helps offenders with respect to sentences, detainers, social assistance, etc.

In short, as you can see, probation officers have a lot of responsibilities and an important job to perform.

If you expect to perform the duties of a probation officer well, you need to develop some core strengths, which include: being a good listener, conveying information clearly, being able to make logical decisions, have strong reading comprehension skills, and a desire to help and work with people.

Don't worry if you don't feel you are strong in all of these areas currently. A good quality probation officer degree or program will help you develop these strengths.

People interested in careers as a probation officer may also be interested in criminal justice degrees as well.

You can request information from online schools completely for free, with no obligation, and it only takes a minute.

Why not take a minute to request FREE information from our select schools on a criminal justice (or other law related) degree:

Kaplan College - KHE -- offers a range of degree programs, including ones in criminal justice and paralegal and so much more.

Whether you're looking for a degree as a probation officer, criminal justice, paralegal, or even a law degree, you'll be sure to find it back at our homepage. Just click the link below to get back to our homepage and browse various degree programs.

We hope you have enjoyed our information on the typical day for a probation officer.


Much more than a typical day for a probation officer back at Accredited Online University Home Page

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