Editor's noteGains and growing pains

Homeland security education is a growing business. Hundreds of colleges and universities now offer on-campus and online degrees in homeland security. The trend started soon after the 9/11 terrorist attacks and has accelerated more recently, according to the National Academic Consortium for Homeland Security, which is based at Ohio State University. There is no data available for the number of students enrolled in the programs.

DHS has a division dedicated to university programs and it is spending tens of millions of dollars every year on grants to colleges with research in national defense and on science and engineering scholarships. The U.S. government’s total tab for homeland security training programs is difficult to pin down because most other divisions within DHS and other federal agencies also are putting dollars toward those efforts.

The academic programs in homeland security lack much consistency because the concept of homeland security itself still is evolving within the federal government, Todd Stewart, director of the National Academic Consortium for Homeland Security, told AP’s Dorie Turner. “In the beginning of 2003, most would say homeland security has something to do with terrorism. If you say it [today], it’s terrorism, earthquakes and who knows what else,” Stewart said. “This is a long way from being an academic discipline.”

Stewart launched the consortium to help shape the programs into a more uniform structure and keep track of what colleges are offering homeland security courses.

Many schools that offer the degrees created their program by regrouping existing courses like biosecurity, terrorism, and Arabic into one area of study. Colleges are beefing up public administration programs and disaster relief training to produce graduates ready to help cities and states plan for and respond to major disasters.

The growing awareness in both the government and private sector of the risks of terrorism, natural disasters, cybercrime, and certain aspects of globalization guarantees that we will continue to see acceleration of three trends: more colleges and universities will be offering homeland security degrees; more universities will begin to offer higher homeland security degrees; and there will be more precise definition of the discipline of homeland security and its components.