Homeland Security Education: A Way Forward

This article appeared in Homeland Security Affairs (February 2013), v.9, article 3While there is nothing particularly wrong with proceeding forward into the uncertain future of homeland security education, much of the movement has been without directional evidence and debates as to direction have generated more heat than light. We conducted research to help us determine trajectory based on evidence. This research produced findings informed by three groups of homeland security professionals. One group, consisting of 382 respondents, represented homeland security leaders and administrators graduating from the master of arts program at the Naval Postgraduate School. The second group consisted of faculty teaching in that graduate program. The third group was a subject matter expert panel of national leaders in homeland security. Surveys were conducted across these groups, asking that they score the importance of objectives and capabilities associated with the multitude of disciplines comprising homeland security. We found that strategic collaboration, critical thinking and decision-making, foundations of homeland security, and analytical capabilities are the most important attributes of a graduate program dedicated to homeland security. Cognate or specific knowledge, the category frequently argued about in the literature, was scored as the least important category for graduate education. These capabilities and attributes represent a “way forward” that is research- and evidence-based, but questions remain