Mystery Reader, Criminal Justice Grad School, Few Questions

Criminal Justice Online Blog - Email Envelope I recently had a great e-mail conversation with one of my blog readers and I thought this can be helpful for some of you. Just remember, it is a personal e-mail so nothing is scripted. Take it for what it’s worth. Hope it helps some of you.

The Story – The Questions

Hey Radek, I left a couple comments on the blog, but I wanted to say hi and shoot you an email — I’m in a graduate program for Criminal Justice right now at SUNY Albany, and I’m thinking about applying for a PhD (but I have a lot of interests so I’m not sure what my focus would be at all whatsoever!) but I was just wondering if you had encountered doctorate types in the field or knew much about where they fit in?

I’m not really interested in academia yet at my age (and generally it seems like universities and CCs [Community Colleges] prefer people with both credentials AND CJ system experience), I figure I’d be in my mid-late 20s by the time I finish a doctorate, but I would like to work for either my state or the national government in investigation or analysis, is there a danger of over-qualification though? Would it be overburdening myself to get a doctorate instead of just applying away with a master’s degree? I really sorely lack experience, all I have under my belt is a year of non-profit work and a year as an intern/glorified clerk at the local attorney general’s office so I don’t really feel confident that I could get a position at this point.

Anyways, though, thanks for maintaining the blog, I really enjoy checking it out and it was a big confidence boost for me to read your posts about jobs with the alphabet soup of Fed. agencies that like CJ grads!

- Mystery Reader

The Response

Consider yourself a blessed entity in the criminal justice realm. SUNY Albany is one of the best. Kudos!

I understand your questions and confusion that is related to picking out the best PhD program for you. It is the contention that you would go into Criminology after your Master’s. Unfortunately there is no cornucopia of PhD kinds to choose from. One piece of advice is to look for PhD programs that are NOT within the criminal justice direct line of sight (aka PhD in Criminal Justice, Justice Administration, and Criminology).

For example, I am very interested in the studies that are related to terrorism. I love the Criminal Justice and Criminology side of terrorism related issues, but I found that to get my proper fix of healthy education and terrorism information I had to look into the field of Political Science with an emphasis on International Security (check out MIT’s program to see more). Or, search “Australia” on my blog – one of the best transnational crime programs is in AU.

Very often a PhD degree will suffice with higher learning institutions (experience won’t hurt). Academia may be an option, if you would like.

I know that there’s always a risk of over-qualification, but that’s usually on an individual level, not an organizational one. Thus, if you get passed up based on your Doctorate credentials, it is usually the judgment of one, or a few, individuals who are mostly worried about their careers and you passing them by.

Another issue that may present itself is budget. It is not uncommon to hire Master level grads over PhDs, based on salary offers. However, yet again, a professional organization will always offer the position to a PhD grad with the lower salary clause. Most municipalities and government agencies are looking for more qualified individuals, and even if you had to take a pay cut in the beginning, your status as a doctoral grad will propel you further, and surely, will increase your bottom line over time.

Experience is something you are gaining by sitting in on those seminars, and even though you don’t have the proverbial “street cred” you will get it with time. Most government agencies will hire a demonstrated and professional Master level grad. Considering that you’re looking into the government sector, you should have no problem – despite your concerns.

I am sitting on the fence right now, because I would like to get into your school (LOL), Penn State, or MIT (I have a few more I like). My take on it – a PhD by your mid or late 20′s is great, and if you have the will, you should go for it.

Thank you for the kind words and your input.

- Radek

The Response To The Response

Hey, thanks for getting back to me!

That’s a lot of food for thought, I really appreciate your reflections on this for sure!

Interestingly what you said about not getting the direct line-of-sight programs in the criminal justice field in specific interest areas like studying terrorism from the perspective of CJ orgs like Interpol actually kind of reassures me that getting the PhD in Criminal Justice MIGHT actually be appropriate for me… I don’t have any interest in sociology approaches (Criminology, or well except for comparative because it’s really cool to read about the way things are done in Japan and other countries of course…), but Criminal Justice — the system, institutions, and the players — are all very interesting to me.

One nice thing in Albany’s program too might be that I could take the IT concentration to show the “credentials” in GIS, SPSS, and all that sort of buzz-word kinda tech stuff employers like to know about! And I actually wouldn’t mind teaching as much as I mentioned earlier, it would be something I’d prefer doing after some professional experience, but if life thrusts me towards that I wouldn’t complain at all.

You know and it’s funny because — as far as I’m aware — I’m the only person in the program who comes from a humanities background rather than a social science or bio/hard science background, so I feel like a little bit of an anomaly (but in a good way) in the program and feel like I bring and take away completely different things to/from the program as a result. I guess an example would be my more crafted presentation of research, pushing for emotional as well as logical appeals for academic arguments.

And I mean like I said, my interests are pretty wide and I don’t seem to have any specific thing I can point to and say “aha!” I have interest in crime analysis and strategy planning, law enforcement intelligence, white collar crime (it seems like that’s more of a law school thing though?), historical research, field observation (did it once in an adjudication system class — observing court and the like, had a blast doing it), survey design maybe (though I haven’t tried it), legal research, using technology/crime mapping/stat analysis… I honestly haven’t taken a single course in this program that didn’t completely engage me, and that’s really saying something since I was an English major and loved reading and writing, yet hated 70% of my courses as an undergrad!

That’s great to hear you’re looking into the PhD thing too, I really like going to Albany (I didn’t like it at first, but it was a big under-renovation mess and I had a crazy ex-gf trying to kill me on the uptown campus) but it’s grown on me. Albany, NY has got a lot of government agencies to work/intern with, and is a close hop away from NYC and Boston, so it’s also a great place for opportunities, like the internship I had. MIT would be great though since it has your specific interest there, plus Boston is like the nicest city in the east by far if you ask me…

But really, thanks for your response. I feel a lot more encouraged now and I think applying to this thing might be for real even this very week!

- Mystery Reader

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{ 2 comments… read them below or add one }

Vanessa October 25, 2010 at 11:29 am

well i want ask a question. i have two more years in high school and before i go to collage life i want make sure that im going for the right career. i want to be a crime scene investigator but i want to be really sure what are the majors i should take and if i have to be a police officer to be what i wnt to be. thank you.

Radek M. Gadek October 30, 2010 at 12:36 pm: Please see the list of careers on my site. It is loaded with info on different careers, including CSI and the requirements for such a position. But in short, depending on the department you might not need to be a police officer to do crime scene work. If you’re interested in being a detective (aka investigator) then you must be a police officer first. It’s a different investigator position from the CSI one. I also know of a few detectives who have CSI qualifications to handle and collect evidence at a crime scene. The options seem to be many.

Some common majors for CSIs are Forensic Science, Criminal Justice, Biology, and Chemistry. I would recommend you speak with your high school counselor about you career choice and so you talk to him/her about college majors, too.

Run a search for “CSI” on my site to get more great info about the career.