The Bachelor of Arts in Criminology provides students with a broad, liberal arts education that encourages them to think critically about crime, law, and justice. Our courses routinely examine social structural foundations of crime, deviance, and social control, as well as the power dynamics involved in defining crime, prosecuting crime, and sanctioning of deviance and those "at risk."
Students with a BA in criminology find careers in social and human service occupations related to criminal, juvenile, and social justice. The criminology degree provides an excellent basis for graduate study in criminology, other social sciences, and law.
All students in the criminology major are required to take 45 hours of coursework beyond the introductory course, Sociology: Understanding Social Life (SOCS 1810).
Required courses include:
- Sociological Classics (SOCI 2020)
- Sociological Imagination and Inquiry (SOCI 2005 and SOCI 2006)
- Criminology (SOCI 2250)
Students must also take a minimum of 25 additional hours in criminology-related courses, 10 of which can be the Internship/Practicum.
Elective courses should be selected from the following list:
- Juvenile Delinquency (SOCI 2255)
- Deviance and Society (SOCI 2260)
- Seminar in Current Issues in Sociology (SOCI 2700; must be criminology-related)
- Law and Society (SOCI 2750)
- Discipline and Punishment (SOCI 2760)
- Kids and Courts (SOCI 2770)
- Women and the Law (SOCI 2780)
- Family and the Law (SOCI 2785)
- Policing Society (SOCI 2790)
- Capital Punishment (SOCI 2795)
- Drugs and Society (SOCI 2820)
- White-Collar Crime (SOCI 2830), and selected topics.