Teens get hands-on training at FBI "summer camp"
At the FBI Academy last week, four dozen teenagers, selected from hundreds of applicants across the country, got a very different kind of summer-camp experience -- a week with real agents in the field and in the classroom, learning about what it's really like inside the FBI, reports CBS News' Chip Reid.
"We were working an undercover case. I had an offsite, covert, covert cars, undercover agents working to infiltrate violent drug organizations," said agent William Woodson, who has run the Future Agents in Training program since 2012.
The students learn about things like counterterrorism and interrogating a suspect.
"The best part is to come out here and to see what they learned in the classroom and to see them put it to work out here -- here in Hogan's Alley," he said.
Hogan's Alley is a fake town at the FBI Academy in northern Virginia, the same town where real FBI agents do their training.
On this harrowing day, Hogan's Alley was victimized by both a bank robbery and a bomb plot.
After gathering the evidence, the young agents headed for a makeshift headquarters to get ready to present their case to a judge. They also filled out an arrest warrant.
With all the paperwork signed, and after a few trial runs, they were ready for the big moment.
"Police, open up! Arrest!" a student yelled, as a group streamed into a pharmacy.
Just like real life, however, things didn't always go smoothly.
"I have a bomb," a pharmacist said.
Eventually, justice prevailed.
Of course the guns are fake and the suspects and witnesses are all FBI employees, but that didn't keep it from feeling real. A student said her adrenaline was pumping.
"You saw like one person actually had a bomb, so you definitely have to be on your toes," the student said.
Even before this experience, most of these teens already had a good idea of what they wanted to do with their lives. Now, they know.
In a show of hands, all the attendees said they wanted to be an FBI agent after the program, despite the risks.
"I am fine with putting my life on the line to save other people," said Ian Chambers of Springfield, Virginia.