Valentina, Community Parole Officer, Edmonton Area Parole

Valentina
Community Parole Officer

Hi, my name is Valentina and I'm currently a community Parole Officer at Edmonton Area Parole.

I was in University, I wasn't really sure what I wanted to do. I was getting my Bachelor of Arts major in psychology and he was actually a friend of a friend that knew that I was really interested in crime, knew that I really liked working with people, and so they said, why don't you try and get a job with corrections?

I'm just very passionate about it. I love going to work every day. I don't look at it as dealing with these like, horrible human beings every day. I'm dealing with humans and I'm trying to contribute to public safety by setting these offenders up with the best release plans possible.

I do a lot of like one-on-one with the offenders because a lot of them don't have positive support, so a lot of them just need an outlet. So, if you're like a listening ear and you care about them doing well, they share a lot with you. And that in itself is very helpful in them being successful because as soon as they can start talking about their problems in a safe environment, they're more motivated to work on it.

In an institution you’re more so like just dealing with the offender and everything that's going on with them.

Whereas in the community, once they get out, you have all of these other moving pieces, like you're now dealing with their family, whether it's their family members or their partner or their kids. You're dealing with their employer, you're dealing with all these variables that you can't control, and it's just a whole other world.

That is what I love about my job is every day is different. I don't come to work and like sit at a desk all day, every day writing the exact same reports because each case is so different, each intervention that you're trying to create is different, and so that's what keeps you motivated.

So, if I could give someone just coming into the job advice or somebody that was interested in the job, I would say the most important things are definitely self-care, having work life balance and knowing your limits because it is a hard job and being patient, like there's so much to learn in this job and it's constantly changing and just being patient with yourself and knowing that you're not going to have all the answers, and that you have a whole team to support you no matter where you are, whether it's in the institution or the community, and using that team environment.

There are offenders that genuinely want to change, and when you can put in place those interventions or the resources or the support to help them do that, that's when you really feel like you're making a difference.