Department of Sociology (42-43 Park End Street) and Online via MS Teams
Please complete this form if you would like to attend in person.
The event will be followed by a drinks reception. Please email comms@sociology.ox.ac.uk with any questions.
Katy Barrow-Grint is an Assistant Chief Constable with the Crime and Criminal Justice portfolio at Thames Valley Police. Before joining the service she read sociology at the London School of Economics and has retained a keen interest in social science research.
In this talk, Katy will explore how her background in sociology has shaped her career and the role that research can play in contemporary policing.
She will share insights from her academic research on domestic abuse, including her work as co-author of Policing Domestic Abuse – Risk, Policy & Practice, published by Routledge in 2022. Katy will also highlight her efforts in founding the Thames Valley Police Journal, a platform for officers and staff to share academic research, which led to her role as editor-in-chief of the College of Policing’s journal Going Equipped.
Biography
Katy Barrow-Grint joined Thames Valley Police in 2000 having studied Sociology at the London School of Economics. She has worked in a variety of roles and ranks including uniform patrol, CID, neighbourhood policing, child abuse investigation, surveillance and strategic development. At Superintendent rank, Katy has been head of Criminal Justice for Thames Valley Police and the Head of Specialist Operations, running covert policing for the force.
In 2021 she was promoted to Chief Superintendent for local policing in Oxfordshire, as well as holding thematic areas of force business including the Violence Against Women & Girls portfolio, Neighbourhood Policing, Citizens in Policing, and Mental Health. In April 2023 Katy was promoted to Assistant Chief Constable for Crime and Criminal Justice, with force wide responsibility for Crime, Intelligence, Public Protection, Criminal Justice and Forensics.
Katy completed her Masters in Police Leadership and Management at Warwick Business School in 2015. She has a keen academic interest in domestic abuse, and has published an academic journal article on domestic abuse attrition rates and a book chapter on domestic abuse in ‘An Introduction to Professional Policing’. She has also written a book with colleagues titled Policing Domestic Abuse – Risk, Policy & Practice published by Routledge in November 2022. Katy continues to work academically in this field, now focussing on adolescent domestic abuse in a research partnership with the VISION consortium at City University, London.
Katy is always keen to develop the Force’s understanding and learning from the academic work being completed by officers and staff, and as a result, instigated the ‘TVP Journal’, a gateway to recognise the academic work of officers and staff. Following the success of the journal, Katy was asked to be the Editor-in-Chief of the College of Policing publication ‘Going Equipped’. Katy also leads on @WeCops, a twitter debate forum on current police issues in the UK.
In 2024, Katy was the runner up in the World Policing Summit awards in Dubai in the category of Inspirational Female Police Officer.
