Thinking about Criminal Justice PhD Programs?

Is there some issue facing criminal justice professionals today that you believe you can figure out a new approach to?  Are you motivated enough to head up your own research project, and dedicated enough to write a dissertation about your conclusions?

If you have the academic background and the professional experience necessary to tackle the timely issues facing the criminal justice field today–and the intellect to do it right–then you ought to start looking at criminal justice PhD programs.

What are PhD programs like?

Getting your PhD in criminal justice isn’t like getting your master’s or your bachelor’s.  You’ll be specializing much more intensively than for either undergrad or graduate study.  In fact, you’ll be specializing not only on one aspect of the field but one particular issue or problem related to one aspect of the field.

Where do I find criminal justice PhD programs?

There are great schools with criminal justice doctoral programs.  But depending on your approach, you may be able to choose a school that doesn’t necessarily have a criminal justice department.  For example, if forensic psychology is your focus, you might find yourself more attracted to the programs offered by a school with an all-star psychology department.  Criminal justice PhD programs are considered such because of the topic you choose, not because of the department that offers the program.

Or maybe you’re a forensic scientist and there’s an aspect of DNA that you’re interested in researching.  You might choose one of the hard sciences–biology, for example–as the basis for your own PhD program.

If your interests lie in social aspects of criminal justice, you might choose a sociology department.  Like if you’d like to apply to criminal justice PhD programs with the intention of doing research regarding crime rates in urban environments, a sociology PhD may be the best fit.

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