Before you think about a license, it helps to know what the job in Odessa actually is. Most of the unarmed security work out here is a gate, a lobby desk, a log sheet and a radio: and it is steadier than people expect.

A Gate Shift in the Permian Basin

Picture the most common unarmed post in this part of West Texas: a controlled gate at a service yard, a fabrication shop, a sand or pipe facility, or a contractor laydown yard somewhere off the loop. You open the shack, check the previous officer’s log, and start running vehicles. Drivers pull up, you confirm who they are and who they are there to see, you write it down, you raise the arm. Trucks come in heavy and leave heavy. Somebody shows up without an appointment and you make a phone call instead of a decision. Around shift change the line backs up and you work it calmly so it clears.

Nothing in that description involves a weapon, and that is the point. The overwhelming majority of the security work in and around Odessa, and in Midland, and out along the I‑20 corridor between them, is unarmed observe-and-report work. The officer’s job is access control, documentation, deterrence by presence, and getting the right person on the phone quickly when something is wrong. The skill being paid for is judgment and paperwork, not force.

The Odessa Posts That Actually Exist

• Industrial and service yard gates: access control, driver logs, contractor check-in, trailer counts.
• Hospital and clinic lobbies: visitor direction, after-hours entrance control, escorting staff to the lot.
• Retail and shopping center loss prevention: floor presence, incident reports, working with store management.
• Apartment and residential community patrol: a long evening loop, parking enforcement, noise and trespass documentation.
• School and campus front desks: visitor badging, door checks, sign-in discipline.
• Construction site access: a real category in a city that builds in bursts, and often overnight.
• Municipal buildings and event venues: bag and door screening, crowd flow, directions.

Every one of those is a job an unarmed, non-commissioned officer can hold. None of them requires a firearm, and most of them will not let you bring one even if you have the credential for it, because the client’s insurance says no.

Working Backwards to the License

So what stands between you and those posts? One course. Under 37 TAC §35.141(a)(1), the Level 2 training course must be completed by anyone applying for a non-commissioned security officer license. That is the entry-level, unarmed credential, and it is what every post on the list above is built on. Level 2 is also the required first step toward a security officer commission later, so nothing you do here is wasted if you change your mind.

The course material is prepared or approved by the Texas Department of Public Safety, and the subject matter matches the work: Texas security law, the professional responsibilities of a security officer, emergency procedures, and ethics. Read that list against the gate shift described above and it lines up exactly. What your authority is, what it is not, how to write an incident so it holds up, and what to do when something genuinely goes wrong.

There is no firearms training and no firearms qualification in Level 2. If a job posting says “Level 2, armed,” the posting is wrong. Carrying on duty is the Level 3 commissioned officer pathway, and that is a separate course with a separate license.

Two Ways to Get It, and Why That Matters in Odessa

Level 2 may be delivered either by the licensee’s own designated person or by a DPS-approved school with a DPS-approved instructor (§35.141(a)(1), §35.142, §35.143). Some larger companies run it in house. Plenty out here do not, or they run it once a quarter when enough new hires stack up. Taking the Level 2 course through an approved school on your own means you walk into the interview already holding the certificate instead of waiting on someone else’s schedule. East Texas Security Training Academy runs it 100% online, which matters when the alternative is a classroom seat several hours east.

Paperwork, and One Thing You Will Not Have to Do

You finish the course and receive a certificate of completion (PSP 36), and that certificate must be submitted with your license application. Keep a copy. Employers ask for it again.

Here is the part almost nobody knows: under §35.161(b), noncommissioned security officers are specifically exempt from continuing education requirements. Unarmed officers do not owe CE hours. That obligation attaches to commissioned officers, who keep their credential current through the armed security renewal course. If you are working a gate in Odessa on a non-commissioned license, that is a burden you simply do not carry.

Questions about eligibility, the application, or which class fits where you are right now are covered on our FAQ page, and the full course list lays out the whole progression in order.