Justice, Law and Criminology, our department, we focus on issues, social justice issues, policy issues, related to justice, law, and criminology. Criminal Justice is the study of the system-- How the system works? Is the system fair? Criminology is why do people commit crime? One of the things that we pride ourselves on is melding both the practical and the theoretical. So research design, qualitative and quantitative methods, and of course, policy and evaluation work. So what's going on in terms of downtown DC? How our policy is being created? Who gets to be at the table? How do you get a seat at the table? We find that our students advance very rapidly in their careers, because their supervisor or bosses realize that our students have the capability, to not only help develop policy, but to look into the research that drives policy and let the supervisor know to what extent that is valuable research. A lot of our faculty members aren't just academics. It's not just textbook knowledge. So for example, I used to be a corrections officer. There are former police officers still acting and active lawyers on faculty. There are justices from Montgomery County, right nearby areas, right. And so that practical knowledge combined with scholarship, leaves a really dynamic classroom conversation. Being in the Washington DC area is a wonderful place to be and the research opportunities in corrections and law enforcement in the courts are open. And in terms of policy implications, where you have access to all the embassies, it does have advantages. I have students who did internships for now Vice President Harris, right. Those things are in reach here. It's one thing to have passionate about something-- I think most Americans would say that they have passion about social justice issues. It's another thing to back passion with a skill set, and that's what you'll do here.
