[Music]
>>JANE QUIMBY: I think the reason that criminal
justice is such a great avenue to pursue for
a student is, you have the opportunity to
truly make a difference in society.
It's something where your job satisfaction
is huge, it's a challenge in terms of what
you have to learn and have to do on a daily
basis, but there's just nothing else like
it.
>>MICAH CONRADS: I think that the criminal
justice faculty do a really good job of bring
their personal field experience into the classroom.
For example we have a retired lawyer, a retired
FBI, a retired police officer and they just
do an amazing job of bringing in the experience
that they have and the stories that they have
and bringing them into the classroom so we
can learn from what they have experienced.
>>QUIMBY: We have a crime scene house which
we utilize in a couple of different teaching
programs, multi-disciplinary programs to include
biology, chemistry, the forensics, forensics
anthropologists, as well as criminal justice.
Where our students actually get an opportunity
to have hands on real world experience in
a realistic setting.
>>CONRADS: With the crime scene house, when
they set up the full scenario, there will
be witnesses that we have to talk to and find
their stories, find out the lies in their
stories, and how their stories are in line
with one another.
It is all being supervised by people who do
it in their everyday job.
>>MELISSA CONNOR: At the research station
at FIRS, undergraduates actually get to work
with human remains and watch the decomposition.
This is one of six decomposition research
facilities in the United States and one of
only two where the student population is predominately
undergraduate.
So this I think is something that people can
come to CMU and get that they can't get elsewhere.
>>TIANA COUSE: Today, my favorite part of
the program is the hands on work, I'm a very
hands on learner so to be able to actually
go out and use the metal detectors , make
mock crime scenes, or make mock graves sights,
and to actually be able to sketch map them,
find things, or solve a fake case, it gives
me the glance to what my career is going to
be like and obviously it is all going to be
completely different because it is all going
to be real, but I'm learning how to understand
what to do.
>>KATE DREILING: One of the things that we
work on with our criminal justice program
and our students is bridging theory and practice.
So we work really hard giving students opportunities
for hands on learning but we also want to
focus on the academic rigor side of things
too.
So we work hard to train them in the field
of doing research and evaluation because once
they get out in the field, one of the new
things that is going on right now is evidence
based practices, meaning we are trying to
determine what works and what doesn't in the
criminal justice field with crime prevention.
So we definitely want to make sure our students
are well prepared for that environment so
we need to work on those critical thinking
skills, analytical skills, research methods,
and things like that.
>>CONRADS: The professors in the program have
very real view on how to get students to where
they want to go and help them achieve those
goals.
So it's a challenging program, but you also
have everybody around you supporting you.
[MUSIC]
