Nine Cumberland County police departments – including South Portland, Cape Elizabeth and Scarborough – are pooling resources to offer a 10-week citizens’ police academy that will give students a firsthand look at how officers do their jobs.

Dubbed the Citizen Orientated Policing School (C.O.P.S.), the academy will show the complexities and nuances of police work, from conducting patrols and making arrests to investigating crimes and handling violent situations.

The other participating police departments are Portland, Yarmouth, Freeport, Westbrook, Falmouth and the Cumberland County Sheriff’s Office.

All that is required of participants is a commitment of time to attend the free, weekly three-hour classes, held at the various police agencies that participate.

The final week will be dedicated to graduation, which will be held at Southern Maine Community College in South Portland.

Students will not be trained to be police officers, noted South Portland Police Officer Linda Barker, who is helping to write the course curriculum. The aim is to show people firsthand how police departments operate.

“Academies like this increase public awareness of law enforcement and what it means to be police officer,” said Barker, a police officer for 26 years.

Citizen police academies are not new in the United States. In 1985, the Orlando (Fla.) Police Department pioneered the first citizens’ police academy, with the aim of reducing crime by improving communication with the public.

Police consider the academies a good public relations tool. Police agencies may battle perceptions that they are not responsive enough or over-reactive.

Instead of just seeing the uniform, participants get to know the officers and to understand the rules and regulations that govern their work.

Many Maine municipalities, from Saco to Old Town, have offered academies.

South Portland has conducted citizens’ police academies in the past, but the time and staffing required make it difficult for one agency alone to sustain them on a regular basis.

The new collaborative will enable police departments to share costs and resources, said Bill Herbert, a criminal justice instructor at Southern Maine Community College who will serve as facilitator during the 10-week course.

Plus, he said, the multidepartment setup reflects the reality that police agencies commonly handle assignments that involve several departments, whether it is mutual aid or criminal investigations.

For the C.O.P.S. academy, each police agency will conduct one three-hour session based at its department.

SMCC will help with administrative support, in addition to providing the site for the academy’s graduation, as a community service. The goal is to hold academies throughout the year.

The deadline to send applications is Aug. 15. Members of the public who are interested in participating should contact the police department in the city or town where they reside.

Students will be picked on a first-come, first-served basis, with only three students tapped per city or town.

In addition, three students will come from Cumberland County and will likely be residents of towns that are not direct participants in the academy.

Applicants who do not get accepted in the fall academy will be put on a waiting list for future academies.

Participants will first have to undergo a criminal background check to be accepted in the program. Applicants with felony convictions or extensive criminal backgrounds will not be accepted.

Although some citizen police academies take participants on ride-alongs and even let them try their hand at target practice, the southern Maine collaborative will focus on classroom training.

Students will get a tour of police departments and also meet officers from the dive team, bomb squad and K-9 corps.

Topics to be covered include the role of the police officer, hiring, ethics, juvenile justice, domestic violence, responding to people with mental illness and working with diverse ethnic groups.

At the end of the course, participants will get the chance to try the Firearm Training Simulator Machine, which flashes “shoot/don’t shoot” scenario on a screen with life-size figures. The simulator tests a person’s response to potentially deadly situations.

“There is a curiosity out there by the popular press and media about police work,” said Herbert, the SMCC instructor and a retired police officer.

“This is an opportunity to bring the civilian population in for a look behind the curtain to see what police officers do and the skill sets they need to do their jobs.”