Visiting Assistant Professor of Anthropology & Sociology Kaja Tretjak, Associate Professor of Humanities David Plazek and Professor of Behavioral Sciences Susan Green are creating a criminal justice program at JSC. They hope to finish the proposal before the end of the semester, and to have the program up and running by next year.

“The new [program] is a transdiciplinary initiative, bringing together the fields of anthropology, political science, psychology and sociology,” said Tretjak.

This program, which will be a concentration within the Sociology and Anthropology branch of the Behavioral Sciences department, will be built out of existing courses. “Eighty to 90 percent of courses are already in the catalogue,”said Plazek. These courses include Intro to Political Science, American Government and Anthropology. ”Criminology has a lot of ties to anthropology,” said Plazek.

Because of the program’s utilization of existing courses, neither Tretjak nor Plazek forsees the need for the college to hire new professors. As the program grows, hiring new professors may become more of a necessity, however. “The JSC departments involved may also bring in additional part-time faculty with expertise specific to the program’s needs,” said Tretjak.

A program in criminal justice is largely a response to ongoing interest in and demand for this kind of offering. “The proposal is in response to years of inquiries by prospective students and parents alike, expressing a strong interest in criminal justice and related fields,” Tretjak said.

Echoing Tretjak’s observation that a demand for such a program exists, Plazek said, “Students are begging for this …and we are trying to meet the demand.”

The idea for the new program gained further momentum after a Faculty Assembly meeting during which the admissions department wished aloud that there was some kind of degree in criminal justice at JSC.

While the program will initially exist as a concentration within the Sociology/Anthropology offerings, launching it will be more streamlined than if it were going to be a free-standing major, which would have involved approval at multiple levels, including the VSC board of trustees.

“There is a great deal of commitment and interest in the new program at JSC, and I hope we can make it work as soon as possible,” said Tretjak, who asserted that the program will facilitate access to a variety of career options: “Opportunities include careers in law enforcement and criminal investigation, crime analysis, border patrol, probation, parole, corrections, security, juvenile justice and victim advocacy, as well as in human rights, community development, social justice reform and advocacy and public policy.”