Difference between criminal justice, police science, and criminology degree?
First please realize that none of those majors will give you any special benefit in becoming a real cop nor in being a great street cop or making it to detective. cj reviews and all parts of the system, courts, cops, defense, prosecution and corrections police science is not a thinking persons major. It gets into technicalities that, in real police work, change daily. criminology is a social science looking at such things as the causes and cures for criminal behavior. Of the 3 crim at least gives you a few of the skills you really need.As far as major or course of study goes. Only a few departments care if your major was in English Lit. or in botany. The couple I have found state what they want on their department recruitment web site. I feel that any of the police related courses of study, like criminal justice, police science, etc. are way too limited in scope for a future cop. Cops need wide ranging education and experience to be effective. When you attend a police academy you get the current criminal justice classes you need to be a cop. Remember that the academy is a police college. In fact many award credit hours via a local community college You want to be a detective, well a detective is a synthesizer. A person who uses their wide ranging knowledge to bring together dispirit information into a whole. A detective uses their experience, as a real police officer and as an officer who has attended court often and learned from their mistakes, to make a case that will pass muster against a bad guy, thus helping to take the bad guys away from society. Concentrating on police type classes does not help you with any of what makes a good cop or detective. Having a generalized education can help. Learning to use and develop your critical thinking skills is essential. Grounding in science can help but so can taking classes like introduction to philosophy or comparative religions where you have to look at each concept, no matter how attractive or distasteful, in a manner that can lead you to a truth.
What can I do with a Criminal Justice degree and a minor in Political Science?
Previous responders have spoken well - law or other grad school, politics. Adding a bump like internship, low level employment experience, being active in a campaign or in my case, additional studies will go far with a school or employer, mostly because of the effort shown.Both CJ and PS are are career specific but remember, an undergrad degree is about learning how to think and learn, so any field is possible. Your combination would be especially useful in LE with an eye to administration after a stint as a cop. Direct local, state or even federal admin or elected positions are suited as well.As has been stated, just the BA is enough if you want to change your career trajectory. In my senior year I decided to pursue a doctorate in Christian ministry. They didn’t want me to have a religion degree because that was what they were going to teach me but CJ was a bit iffy. I just bumped my Sociology minor to a double major and spent the summer studying Greek.With that and my GPA I got a full scholarship. The Sociology education served me very well in the ministry and when I got worn out by church people I fell back to LE for a few years and returned to parish work refreshed. (The Presbyterian church has a sweet retirement fund which I am now enjoying.)Go get ‘em.
Should I major or minor in criminal justice? I am currently majoring in public administration and minoring in criminal justice, but I was wondering if I would have better job opportunities with a B.S. in criminal justice instead of a minor.
Great question. It all depends on what it is that you want to eventually do as a career. If your plan is to get into a career in Law Enforcement, then you really don’t need a degree in Criminal Justice unless you plan on working at the federal level, which is what I’d suggest anyway. The job market for someone with a degree in criminal justice is not that high, in my opinion. My suggestion would be to get your degree in public administration with a minor in criminal justice as I believe there are more opportunities in that market. You could always attend a 6 month police academy if that is something you’d want to try and gain some experience. I hope this feedback helps you make an informed decision, and great job in attending college for a post secondary education. Best of luck. Data Trail Services & Investigations
Do you need a criminal justice degree to be a police officer?
No. In fact, I don't recommend that degree to anyone considering a law enforcement career. Most of my coworkers in law enforcement who had bachelor's degrees did not get them in criminal justice. I read some of the textbooks from that major in my free time to see if I should add it as a minor or a second bachelor's degree while I was working for a university where I got a great tuition and fees break as part of the employee benefits package. I did not invest my time in pursuing course credits. I learned more useful and current information by going to advanced training courses as continuing education after I was a police officer.Ask yourself what you can do with that degree if an injury or something else changes your career plans and nothing in law enforcement is a possibility. It happens. In addition, many people retire or otherwise leave law enforcement before reaching full retirement age. A person who has a degree in another field that provides additional skills and opportunities likely has an advantage in job hunting should they need to work in a new career for many years.There is nothing wrong with taking some classes from the criminal justice degree program as electives ot even doing a minor or a dual degree. However, college has gotten much more expensive in recent years. Getting a degree that will not provide a significant advantage in getting hired in law enforcement and little to no advantage in other career fields just seems like a poor use of one's time and money in my estimation. An academy will teach you what is necessary for the basic policing and other law enforcement training courses and specialized schools will flesh that out further once you know better what interests you within the field.In contrast, a degree in English or journalism can be a real aid in producing good work as a patrol officer when quality paperwork and an eye for detail can build solid cases that rarely have to go to trial. Spotting issues, gathering information and many other skills from journalism overlap with police work and as I discovered later, with being an attorney. Having a degree in something like chemistry can lead to other opportunities in law enforcement that are open to few people. I went through my state academy with a lady who was hired directly after college into the Oklahoma State Bureau of Investigations as an agent because of her chemistry degree.
Can you become a police officer if you have a misdemeanor on your record?
Maybe. It depends on what the misdemeanor is, how recent it was, and the circumstances of the incident. If the offense is for domestic violence or some sex offense, you're done. Don't even try. If it's for a violent offense, such as assault and/or battery, you will need around ten years (this varies) of very clean living between the offense and your application. You will need to show that you realized your mistake and have the ability to conduct an honorable, law-abiding life. If the offense is a "moral turpitude" crime, such as shoplifting or embezzlement, you may be disqualified. This is a "maybe" situation, and while one agency might accept you, another one wouldn't. Once again, you'll need to show you can lead a law-abiding life for a good stretch of time. A DUI can be disqualifying for ten years or more. Complete abstinence from alcohol is recommended. An offense like minor in possession of alcohol won't be overlooked, but it's not as damaging as some of the others I mentioned. In every case, the agency doing your background investigation will do their best to get the original report of the offense, and to interview anyone connected with it. If there were any extenuating or aggravating circumstances about the matter, you want to be the one to tell your background investigator about it. If they find out on their own that the situation was more screwed up than you described it to be, you're probably going to get disqualified. Those stretches of clean living between your offense and your application need to be exemplary in every way. No arrests, no tickets, good work history, all bills paid, etc. If you have a conviction on your record, the bar is going to set higher for you.
Major in Criminal Justice minor in FL?
As someone who contemplated getting a CJ degree for a couple of years, I will tell you right now, it really isn't worth it. If you want to do law enforcement, this is pretty much the only job it would qualify you for. And the irony of it all is that you ask a law enforcement officer if your degree matters and they will tell you that any degree is good to them. That being said, if you want to work for the government, and specifically the FBI, you would be better off with a computer science degree, accounting, and believe it or not, depending on the language, that could even be to your benefit. You'd have to check the FBI website though to see what languages they are interested in. If you get a graduate degree in criminal justice then that could be more beneficial but honestly, if you don't want to go to graduate school, go for something other than CJ. PS in case it isn't obvious. Latin is not gonna help you do crap at the FBI...Just saying. This is the CIA website and more specifically their language career section. If you look on the side you'll see the other types of jobs they have! https://www.cia.gov/careers/opportunities/foreign-languages/index.html
Can I still become a police officer with a marijuana possession and drug paraphernalia charge?
What he said. Although if the American CRB works like the English, your slate is wiped clean when your 18 and although I think that somehow, somewhere it is still traceable, it cannot/should not be used against you in employment, however I'm not sure it is the same with the Police force and even if they were still unable to use it againt you, an applicant with a more impeccable, or 'suitable' background etc would pip you to the post, your also not getting in the army if you keep the whole drugs thing going, hope you head down the right path, good luck!x
What doors can a major in Criminal Justice with a minor psychology open for me?
Do you like begin a probation officer?… Because getting a Bachelors in Criminal Justice is how you become a probation officer… maybe a position in a police department as a patrol officer.Why would you spend $100,000 for a generally at best $40,000-$50,000 a year job starting?There are a few agencies that require 4 year degrees, but policing is generally learned at an academy or through community college continuing education. That criminal justice degree may earn you a few more bucks on patrol (maybe a 10% per year raise) , but more likely the money would be better spent on some sort of different degree. Criminal Justice degrees are fairly useless. They are the modern day equivalent of a Phys Ed degree. Useless for law school and have no real world application outside policing or related jobs like probation. They can’t teach you anything you won’t learn in your first year on the job as a cop and there is a huge difference between reading about the application of criminal law and actually applying it. Despite what some would have you believe, dealing with criminals and justicing them is a fairly hands on activity. You would be better served as a cop getting almost any other degree, including a degree in adult or business education or government administration. Heck, the FBI likes accountants historically almost as much as it likes Mormons. If you are interested in forensics you would be better served by getting a BS in some analytical science or chemistry. A Criminal Justice degree is sunk time and money.
If I'm planning to become a police officer, what is a good degree to study in a university to boost my performance?
I'd say to pick something which you like and can use as a backup if the PD doesn't work out well for you, or your health fails, or an injury puts you out of the job. Maybe minor in law enforcement, if anything.Most Police Departments just see “bachelor's degree” and put a check mark in a box. They aren't especially impressed by a degree in law enforcement.I know you think you're going to love police work, and they're going to love you. Lots and lots of people get through the academy and quit within their first year on the street. There's nothing wrong with them. They just figured out that they really, really hated the job.The worst part is, there's not many degrees more worthless than a law enforcement degree when you've quit being a cop within the first year.Get a degree in something else you like. Maybe make a side job out of it later. A computer science degree might be useful, if you like that subject. It might make you more valuable as a cop or detective if you end up liking it, too. It gives you a niche. If you think you could stomach being a teacher, major in some subject you'd like to teach in high school as a backup plan to your police career. A business administration degree can be useful. If you stay in police work, that business degree can serve as a foundation for a Masters in Public Administration later on in your career when you want to advance. It can be the basis for an MBA if cop work doesn't work out.College is expensive. You can always minor in law enforcement, or you can go be an axillary cop for free to gain a little law enforcement background to go with whatever major you choose. Get the most out of the expensive part, though, by making it work for your backup plan as well as for putting a check mark in the “bachelor's degree” box on your application.This is a sort of “avoid my mistakes” lecture, by the way. I was a law enforcement major. I'd say one class, which I took for one semester, has really stuck with me and had a positive impact on my career. It was a Constitutional law class where I learned to write case briefs, sort of like a dumbed-down version of what a law school student might do, and the cases we studied were all Supreme Court cases which form the backbone of modern police policies. Other than that, I'd say the English Composition classes as part of the core curriculum were far more valuable than any of the other law enforcement classes I took.