Friday, Febraury 20, 2004

CCSU to add criminal justice degree

The Board of Regents of the University System of Georgia, at its February meeting, approved Clayton College & State University’s request to establish a bachelor of science degree in criminal justice.

Clayton State had been planning to establish a baccalaureate criminal justice program for some time, with the specific goal to meet the expanding law enforcement needs of south metro Atlanta, in that the bachelor’s degree is becoming a much more important credential in the law enforcement community. The addition of the major will also significantly advance the University’s mission-based responsibility to bring “educational opportunities to the citizens and businesses of the Southern Crescent to contribute to the region’s future development.”

The new major, which will officially “roll out” in August, is a generalized degree in criminal justice that will also feature a special emphasis on computer forensics, white collar crimes, and security concerns, the latter being of critical concern given the presence of Hartsfield-Jackson International Airport in the region. It will be housed in the School of Arts & Sciences' Department of Social Science, which is chaired by Dr. Eugene Hatfield. Dr. Kevin Demmitt, who, along with Hatfield, is one of the main architects of the criminal justice proposal, will serve as criminal justice program coordinator.

“With the addition of this undergraduate degree in criminal justice at CCSU, we now open the academic doors to a huge pool of prospective students who otherwise would have had to travel great distances to get credentialed in this field,” noted Dr. Ray Wallace, Clayton State dean of Arts and Sciences. “I predict this will be a very large degree program for Clayton State in the years to come. We are all obviously very pleased with this addition in the School of Arts and Sciences, and this is just one of the many new degrees we have at the Board of Regents for approval.”

“There is a lot of excitement about this criminal justice degree program from current students and the community. I receive phone calls daily from prospective students who are anxious to pursue this course of study,” added Demmitt. “Our criminal justice curriculum will build on Clayton State’s strengths of strong classroom teaching and the advanced use of technology. Students will be able to choose electives from the other social sciences, the natural sciences, and management to build a broad foundation for a career in the criminal justice system or to pursue a graduate degree. And, students will have the option to select a specialized concentrations in the investigation of computer and white collar crime.”

The baccalaureate program in criminal justice prepares graduates for careers in the criminal justice system or graduate school by combining a criminal justice studies with a foundation in the liberal arts and technology. The curriculum supplements essential coursework in all aspects of the criminal justice system with courses in areas such as psychology, history, political science, sociology, biology, communications, and management.

The criminal justice major at Clayton State will target both “pre-service” students who are interested in entering the law enforcement field and “in-service” students who are already working in the field and seeking advancement through the acquisition of the bachelor’s degree.

Earning a B.S. degree in criminal justice prepares graduates for a variety of careers in the criminal justice system. In addition to positions in law enforcement, criminal justice graduates work in corrections (e.g. probation/parole officer, prison administration), the courts (e.g. victim advocates, investigators), and private security. A criminal justice degree can also be a foundational degree for going to law school or pursuing a graduate degree in criminal justice, public administration, political science, sociology, and other social and behavioral sciences.