Criminal Justice Degree Online

Program Overview

Since September 11, 2001, local, state and federal criminal justice agencies and American corporations have changed dramatically. We have witnessed:
A shift in priorities toward terrorism, international crime, and cyber crime;
An unprecedented consolidation into super agencies such as Homeland Security which have forced the merging of organizational cultures;
The creation of new partnerships between public and private organizations charged with public safety and private security;
And the challenge to create new strategies to deal with terrorist threats and traditional crime simultaneously.

These changes have created enormous leadership challenges and it is clear that our very survival as a nation will depend heavily on our ability to produce a new generation of exceptional leaders in the field of criminal justice and homeland and corporate security.

This program is offered on the Queens and Staten Island campuses and the University is exploring off-campus cites such as law enforcement academies. Many courses are offered online through Distance Learning and the University offers a blended degree online.

Our Faculty
Our faculty, in addition to their scholarly achievements, all have exceptional leadership credentials and have held (or currently hold) titles such as: commissioner, deputy commissioner, chief, director, prison superintendent, assistant district attorney, supreme court judge, mayor, and special agent.

Upon acceptance to our program you will immediately be networking with this cadre of professional leaders and well on your way to joining their ranks in these exciting agencies. Click on this link to see the academic credentials as well as the real life leadership experience of our faculty. In this program you will learn what makes leaders great from a faculty of great leaders.

This criminal justice program, one of the oldest in the nation, provides a learning environment of superior education in the finest tradition of small public liberal arts colleges. The faculty is an optimum blend of scholars with broad practical experience and diverse academic credentials from different disciplines who support and practice the concept of individual personal attention for each one of our majors; the faculty regularly knows students by their first name. This criminal justice program is large enough to offer all the amenities of a well-funded program but small enough to remain personal and sociable.

Graduates of the Department of Criminology and Criminal Justice at SOU frequently go to work immediately after graduation; many find careers in the same agency where they completed their student internship. Most graduates are employed at municipal, county, state, and federal levels of government throughout the United States but mostly in the Pacific-Northwest serving in positions such as probation officers, parole officers, police officers, law enforcement personnel, juvenile workers, lawyers, private security, and correctional institutions.

September 11, 2001 ignited world change and sharply focused attention on the United States criminal justice system. By continuously growing and creating new criminal justice programs, the faculty and the Department of Criminology and Criminal Justice remain committed to excellence in preparing people to meet the unprecedented challenges facing criminal justice and criminology graduates.

Please take a minute and learn about the faculty, department history, courses, online courses, student services, and academic programs. Thank you.