Bachelor of Arts in Criminology and Criminal Justice online

In this course, we will examine the functions and the structure of primary agencies involved in the crime prevention and control process, which include the police, courts and corrections. We will also explore some contemporary challenges of the criminal justice system.

This course will introduce to the students an overview of (1) the concepts of crime, law and criminology; (2) theories of crime causation; (3) the nature and extent and patterns of different kinds of crimes and social reactions towards the crimes in the American society; and (4) relevant crimes and social policies in other countries. As a writing intensive course, students will engage in writing both as a means to learn the concepts and theories outlined above and as a way to train themselves in conventional styles of criminological writing.

Criminal law is focused on statutory construction and the elements of a crime, as well as defenses. We will explore how states construct their criminal codes and the policy reasons behind the elements of a statute. Students will also learn the theories behind criminalization, legal moralism, culpability, intent, causation, mental capacity, and criminal penalties.

This capstone course is the culmination point for students’ theoretical, methodological, and substantive knowledge of the discipline. It reinforces, applies, and extends previous coursework and key concepts. Students will examine select contemporary empirical and theoretical questions or problems in criminal justice and criminology, with an emphasis on data literacy, in order to propose policy or theoretical solutions. They will demonstrate the ability to integrate information and subject mastery through a combination of written and oral communication and research. This is a writing intensive course that includes one substantive paper. Course content will vary by instructor.

This course is designed to help students apply criminology theory and concepts to the criminal justice system, learn the cultural competency and ethical skills necessary to work in the criminology field, and prepare for the post-college job market in the criminal justice system.  The semester prior to registration, students arrange an internship placement with the assistance and approval of the Department Internship Coordinator. The course requires a minimum of 120 hours of fieldwork during the semester in which the student is enrolled. In addition to completing their fieldwork hours, students attend several 75 minute in-person classes and three-to-four one-on-one meetings with the course instructor in which they receive feedback on their written work.

This course teaches students the process of social scientific inquiry. Students will learn the fundamentals of social science research methods, including the process by which research questions are formulated, relevant literature is reviewed, data are collected and analyzed, and results are written up. As this is a writing intensive course, students will learn methods in part through weekly writing assignments. The end product of the course will be a paper or proposal that has been improved through an iterative process of feedback by the professor and revision by the student.

This course introduces students to approaches for assembling, analyzing and presenting qualitative and quantitative data. Students will become familiar with a variety of sociologically relevant data that are available online. Students will learn how to conduct basic data analyses in SPSS or Excel in order to address questions of sociological and criminological significance.

This course examines corrections as a component of the criminal justice system. The structure, functioning, and socio-historical context of prisons, jails, juvenile facilities, and community corrections such as probation and parole will be covered. Included is the effectiveness of correctional approaches in achieving the goals of corrections—offender rehabilitation, punishment, and incapacitation and victim restoration for example—as demonstrated with empirical evidence and considered within a human right and social justice frameworks

With a comparative approach, this course analyzes how the criminal justics systems interconnect to countries’ crime and crime control issues and to their broader economic and social issues and institutions. It focuses on how countries that have faced major political and social upheavals during the past several decades have struggled to develop workable crime control methods as well as methods of conflict resolution that provide justice for victims, fairness for those accused, and avenues for reconciliation. It also analyzes how global terrorism and internal criminal threats affect countries’ ability to maintain and improve their citizen’s civil liberties and human rights.

This course examines the actual and symbolic role of organized crime in American society. It begins with an overview of the distribution, structure and operation of organized crime over time, including patterns of ethnic succession in the control of organized criminal activities. The course goes on to explore the changing nature of organized crime in the global era. Theories of organized crime are presented and assessed, and the tactics used to combat organized crime are examined. Myths surrounding organized crime are scrutinized critically, and prominent role of organized crime in popular culture is considered. Special attention is paid to a critique of the stereotypes that link organized crime and ethnicity in the popular mind and to the consequences of these stereotypes for the groups involved

This course provides a broad introduction to white-collar crimes: illegal acts motivated primarily by financial gain, business advantage or power, which are characterized by deceit, concealment, or violation of trust, which are not dependent on the direct application or threat of violence. These crimes nevertheless result in great harm, from physical, economic, and emotional harm to environmental degradation and threats to democracy.  It provides students with an historical and sociological overview of such crimes, an understanding of the major types of white-collar crime, and the key theoretical tools developed to diagnose and explain the problem. It also delivers a critical overview of the scope and societal impact of white-collar crime both in the U.S. and internationally; an analysis of public responses to these crimes; and a discussion of the efficacy of strategies to prevent white-collar offenses from governmental and business organizations.

This course seeks to provide students with an overview of intersectional inequalities such as race, ethnicity, class, gender, and sexual identity in crime and the administration of justice, focused primarily in the United States. It also addresses differences in offending and victimization among disadvantaged populations. Students will examine historical and current criminal justice policies and the impact of such policies on community of color, poor people, women, the LGBTQ community, and other disadvantaged groups (e.g. persons with disabilities and the elderly). In addition, the course will examine theoretical perspectives on class, race, ethnicity, gender, sexual identity, and justice. Students will leave this course better understanding the role systems of inequality place in criminal justice policy and practice, and how criminal justice policies and practice impact marginalized populations."

This course introduces the study of terrorism from the perspectives of sociology and criminology. Through an overview of international and domestic terrorism and case studies, the course will first examine controversies in defining terrorism and in distinguishing it from other forms of political violence, and provide a typology for understanding the breadth of terrorist organizations. It then explores the historical and sociological roots of terrorism, examines terrorist motivations as well as their organization, strategies, tactics and the effects of these actions. Counterterrorism—both military and law enforcement responses to terrorism—is critically assessed. Last, the class analyzes the framing of terrorism within political, media, and popular discourses.

This course explores concepts of psychological abnormality and distinguishes between the main theoretical approaches to understanding behavior, normal and abnormal. These models or explanations are actively applied to discussions of major syndromes of abnormal behavior, with special reference to the revised DSM-IV. Prerequisite(s): PSY 1100

Examines the concept of deviance in society through a study of the issues of value judgements, abnormality and eccentricity. Implications are found for the causes of the behavior of groups socially labeled as deviant.

This course gives an overview of juvenile offending. It covers the nature, extent, causes, and patterns of juvenile delinquency and status offending. The course also gives an overview of juvenile justice. It covers the structure and functioning of the juvenile justice system and the role of the community in responding to juvenile offending. Included are discussions of major debates and controversies surrounding juvenile offending and justice.

This course analyzes multiple forms of social oppression and inequality based on race (and color), sex (and gender), sexual orientation (and identity), and class in the United States. It will examine systemic aspects of social oppression in different periods and contexts and the ways that systems of social oppression manifest themselves on individual, cultural, institutional and/or global levels thus becoming self-perpetuating but not wholly unaltered structures. Individual and group agency, strategies of resistance, and visions for change will also be studied.