Volume 8, Issue 2 - Future of Homeland Security and Emergency Management Education

This paper argues that homeland security education must continually adapt to future risks, threats and vulnerabilities. To do this, it will be necessary to look at the many ways of looking at homeland security thinking and practice from multiple perspectives and disciplines. Looking at the homeland security enterprise through a variety of perspectives, taken together and synthesized, can deepen understanding and shed additional light on the scope of the field or discipline. Next, this paper discusses the need for existing and future educational programs in homeland security that are inclusive of the theories, practices and research methods of emergency management, despite the current cultural differences between these fields. Finally, this paper highlights three challenges in the development of homeland security education programs: (1) the development and implementation of a standardized curriculum with core functions and competencies that are inclusive of emergency management, (2) the evolution into a new academic discipline; (3) and the adoption of multidisciplinary or interdisciplinary approaches to teaching and learning.

In order to understand the situation of higher education of emergency management major in China, the relevant information was gathered, the general situation of emergency management higher education of China was introduced and the major problems of the higher education of emergency management faced were identified. Finally, the study put forward some suggestions about the development direction, curriculum design, teacher team training and textbook publication of emergency management higher education in China.

Although processes of tactical decision-making and technology choice occur in both terrorist groups and the security organizations opposing them, these topics are difficult to teach in a classroom setting. A table-top game is described where students play the role of a terrorist group seeking to attack an urban subway and then act as security planners charged with protecting it. The key trade-offs—risk that their plot will be discovered on the terrorist side, and the need to balance effective security measures with their public acceptability on the defense side— are built into the game through point systems that capture the basic dynamics that exist in such situations. Implementation of the game in a graduate-level security studies course is discussed. The game was effective in making abstract threat analysis and security planning concepts more tangible and also facilitated knowledge sharing within groups of students with different levels of knowledge about terrorism and counterterrorism.

To supplement Kiltz’s (2009) research in the Journal of Homeland Security and Emergency Management, this research assessed the critical thinking skills of local emergency managers in the Commonwealth of Virginia to determine specific areas of critical thinking deficiency. An exploratory descriptive research design, using the Watson-Glaser Critical Thinking Appraisal, Form S (WGCTA-S), was used to determine the extent to which a sample of 54 local emergency managers demonstrated the critical thinking skills associated with the ability to assume and manage risk. The WGCTA-S critical thinking scores, of the 54 local emergency managers, were compared to the critical thinking scores of a group of 4790 peer-level managers drawn from an archival WGCTA-S database. Recommendations for future research include determining exactly how to define, assess, and evaluate critical thinking skills for the profession of homeland security and emergency management.

One of the important areas of vulnerability that has been repeatedly identified following the events of September 11, 2001 is the potential for an intentional attack on America’s food supply. Despite the importance of equipping professionals to protect our nation’s food supply, educators face a scarcity of information on which to base food protection and defense curricula and training development efforts. This research sought to identify a set of knowledge content areas required by food protection and defense professionals. A Developing A CurriculUM (DACUM) process was employed to create a job task analysis that identified duties, tasks, steps, and associated knowledge, skills, and abilities for this occupational category. The knowledge areas identified during the DACUM process and validated through a stakeholder survey were used to frame the program for a training workshop and computer simulation in which participants responded to a mock intentional food contamination event. Results of this process can serve as foundational elements that can be shaped by instructional and curricular design experts to create educational programs in food protection and defense for graduate students and in-service professionals.

The Emergency Management undergraduate Bachelors of Science Degree program at Western Illinois University (WIU) is one of the more recent additions to the group of college-level Emergency Management programs. As the WIU program is reaching its fourth anniversary, faculty are now able to pause and reflect on both the challenges and opportunities the program has faced. The authors suggest that the issues faced by the WIU program are indicative of the issues that are generally faced by many college-level Emergency Management programs. Therefore, this paper intends to contribute to the developing body of knowledge concerning Emergency Management education by providing a case study of the development and implementation of the WIU program, within the context of Emergency Management-related higher education.

The field of Homeland Security (HLS) has entered a stage where it is not yet a fully established profession. Drawing on the experience of Public Administration (PA) it is suggested that HLS “act like a profession” to advance the knowledge, skills, and values essential to its role. To do this, the case example of HLS education at Pennsylvania State University is reviewed. Penn State has chosen a matrix form of organization to provide a core of professional identity while allowing students to choose from five options to guide their program of study. It is argued that this approach provides a balance of common and specific subject matter that corresponds to the need for HLS to evolve as a loosely coupled but emergent profession.

In the recent two decades, security education in the former Eastern bloc has been developing dynamically. This process is exemplified by the changes implemented in the Czech Republic. After the fall of communism, a decline of security education was apparent. After the NATO enlargement and during the war on terror, new approaches to security education at primary and secondary schools have been introduced (mostly in population protection). Some universities have accredited security study programs comprising the state specified minimum security education standards. Authors analyze and suggest study programs to prepare both population and university students for emergencies. The process of internationalization of security education and the transfer of know-how to new democratic regimes are illustrated in the article.

This paper describes the experience of designing the curriculum and teaching the subject of Emergency and Civil Protection in a master’s program in Spain, from 2006 to the present. With the restrictions set by key descriptors: civil protection, actions in emergencies and major accidents, and an assigned instructional time of 30 hours, the curriculum consists of 3 thematic units: Emergencies, Emergency Plan and Corporate Autoprotection Plan, and Actions. The methodological approach combines lectures with practical exercises, and overcoming the disadvantage of the lack of suitable notes or book for the study, the interest aroused in the students resulted in an egress level of over 80 percent, more than 20 master’s theses about autoprotection plans have been defended, and a doctoral thesis is in progress.

It is vital that U.S. academic institutions pay heed to the important global challenges that HS academics and practitioners must face. This article finds in an overview of the development of prescriptions for curricular outcomes and competencies for homeland security education in the U.S. that there has been little emphasis on curricular goals in the U.S. of the transnational and global application of homeland security strategies and operations. Transatlantic links in homeland security education between U.S. universities and their counterparts in Europe will be hampered by the virtual lack of explicit academic programs in this field in that continent. An examination of program goals and curricular offerings in U.S. post-baccalaureate programs indicates a modest attempt to provide students some grounding in transnational and global applications of homeland security strategies and operations.

This paper provides a brief history and overview of FEMA’s Higher Education Program and the role it has taken in shaping the emergency management higher education community and the field of emergency management; details the process undertaken to arrive at the most recent effort focused on curriculum outcomes and introduces the substance of that effort; and, suggests next steps in the forward movement of emergency management higher education.

Like many previous areas of study, disaster science is in the process of incorporating a disparate range of analytical and operational concepts into a single, relatively unified discipline. As a “new” science, the field is experiencing simultaneous growth as both an academic topic of study, and as an operational profession. The number of accredited degree programs and the number of professional emergency managers have each grown exponentially in recent years.This realization leads to several simple, yet important, questions: Do emergency management and sociology maintain any meaningful communication with one another? In what ways might academics and practitioners interact? What is the path to translate science theory into practice?Here, we will compare and contrast the academic and practical realms of sociology and disaster science. The methodology will include a review of the search strategies employed, a brief examination of the existing literature, and results from a recent survey of practitioners. Overviews of the National Incident Management System (NIMS) and of traditional or established sociological science will also be provided. These two vantage points will then be compared and contrasted, and the possibility of a combined model examined. This overview will conclude with a summary of the state of the disaster sciences, and the identification of a suggested path forward, which includes increased educational interaction.In essence, the core query becomes whether or not primary elements of sociology are compatible with hierarchal command structures such as NIMS. Of course, the greater conversation regarding disaster science does not exist in a bubble. It has an outcome upon which large numbers of human lives quite literally depend.

In this paper, online scenario simulations were examined. The results show that there is an association between students’ satisfaction with the tools and the grade in the course. These tools add value to understanding the subject matter and provide students with near real-life hands-on experience.

The education of professional emergency managers has been the subject of workshops by the National Science Foundation and the National Academies. There is general agreement on the content of curricula, except for components related to Homeland Security. This article looks at the broad issue of professional education and the need to include information on Homeland Security.

This essay involves a discussion of the essentials of Emergency Management and Homeland Security Graduate education programs. Subjects include the current context of these graduate programs, the critical components of these programs, and emerging trends and issues related to EM-HS programs. These trends include the neccesity of the development of national accreditation standards and promulgating professional bodies to ensure the healthy development of this growing academic discipline.