Caroline Huffaker serves as a Senior Program Manager at the National Policing Institute (NPI). In this role, she is responsible for managing a number of NPI’s initiatives and grant projects within their Local Programs Division. Additionally, she provides technical assistance, policy analysis, and strategic planning on a number of complex law enforcement operations and public safety related topics. Caroline specializes in the establishment of multidisciplinary programming within the law enforcement setting as well as building coalitions across disciplines to ensure that public safety services being provided to the field are research informed and practitioner led. Prior to joining the team at NPI, Caroline worked for the Chattanooga Police Department as their Victim Services and Chaplains Director. There she established the agency’s first professional Victim Services Unit as well as contributed towards the development and implementation of several other projects at CPD. This included supporting the development of CPD’s first peer support program, integrating a Poverty Simulation into the Cadet Academy curriculum, bi-weekly policy review, revisions to the agency’s promotional process, and successfully implementing a multi-year research project with partners from two local Universities. In addition to agency work, Caroline has extensive experience in community-based advocacy, specifically in programming that served victims and survivors of gender-based violence. She considers it a privilege to have served in the field of public safety for over twelve years.

Caroline holds a bachelor’s degree from Berry College, a master’s degree in Clinical Mental Health Counseling from UT-Chattanooga, and a master’s degree in Public Safety from the University of Virginia.