Criminal Justice M.S.

Learn from Experts, Fight for Justice

In this online criminal justice program, you’ll enhance your foundational knowledge, develop written and oral communications skills and expand your critical thinking, reasoning and research abilities. Our faculty are experts — criminal justice practitioners and scholars — who take an active role in mentoring their students.

As an online graduate student, you’ll be challenged to apply ethical principles to complex social and legal issues. You’ll also have opportunities to gain professional experience through credit-bearing internships in criminal justice.

Ways to Study Criminal Justice Online

Students in the criminal justice graduate program can choose from six tracks:

• General Track: Choose six electives from across the tracks in addition to the four core courses.
• Diversity, Inclusion and Belonging: Learn to develop partnerships, facilitate inclusive conversations, create change within an institution, and understand methods for researching, implementing and evaluating diversity, equity and inclusion initiatives. - become fluent in the languages of social identity, the impact of social context and group dynamics and psychological and neuropsychological constructs that result in implicit bias, discrimination and marginalization.
• Forensic Behavioral Health: Take courses on addiction, mental health and youth culture and deviance and learn how to manage these issues
• Federal Law Enforcement: Dig into topics like forensic financial analysis, white-collar crime and federal justice with this track.
• Intelligence and Crime Analysis: Explore the intelligence area of criminal justice at a variety of levels, including intelligence policy and process.
• Homeland Security: Classes on terrorism threats and strategy, risk assessment and the sociology of disaster are covered in this track.

Accelerated Bachelor's/Master's Program in Criminal Justice

Through Saint Joseph’s University's 4+1 program, current undergraduate students can also start earning credits towards the M.S., allowing them to earn a master’s degree in criminal justice in just five years. Students interested in this option must apply to the graduate program in their junior year and be conditionally accepted before they complete their bachelor's degree. Adult learners also have the opportunity to begin earning a master’s while completing their bachelor’s degree through the Accelerated Master’s Degree Program for Adult Learners.

Criminal Justice MS/Applied Behavior Analysis Certificate Dual Program

This unique 72-credit program meets BCBA requirements and prepares students to use a behavioral analytic approach to intervention when working with individuals who struggle with addiction, self-harm, thoughts of suicide and mental health disorders within the criminal justice system. It provides the necessary skills to support neurodivergent people (e.g., those with autism) with navigating the juvenile and criminal justice systems; it also provides the skills for criminal justice officials to help them avoid criminalizing those with mental illness and neurodivergent people.

What Job Can I Get with an Online Master's Degree in Criminal Justice?

A graduate degree in criminal justice will prepare you to take on leadership roles in your community and change the conversation in the field. Getting a master's in criminal justice can help you pursue many careers including:

• Local/State/Federal Law Enforcement Officer
• Intelligence Analyst
• Criminal Investigator
• Federal Agent
• Adjudicated Youth Counselor/Probation Officer
• Substance Abuse Counselor/Parole Professional
   

How Will Saint Joseph’s University Help Me Advance My Career in Criminal Justice?

Rooted in the Jesuit value of "care for the whole person," the Criminal Justice M.S. embraces a human-centered approach to justice. This unique online program will help you draw connections between theory and practice to become a change-maker in your career.

You'll learn among a diverse group of students in an online or in-person classroom that has the city of Philadelphia as a backdrop — a unique and important environment in which to examine issues within the criminal justice system.

At-A-Glance