John Jay College Of Criminal Justice | The City University of New York

Program Director: Professor Margaret Wallace

The Master of Sciene in Forensic Science is designed to provide advanced education for scientists, administrators, directors and other professionals currently employed in crime laboratories, medical examiners’ offices and in such related areas as public safety, arson investigation and environmental protection.  The program also prepares people who are interested in entering such careers.  Drawing from the areas of chemistry, biology, physics and law, the program involves the mastery of techniques for the laboratory and the courts.  The curriculum meets an urgent national need for broadly trained forensic scientists.

The master’s program offers specializations in criminalistics, molecular biology and forensic toxicology.  Within these three areas, sub-specialization is available through electives offered periodically at John Jay College or (with permission) at the CUNY Graduate School and University Center.

Program details:
Degree Requirements
Required Courses
Criminalistics Track
Molecular Biology Track
Toxicology Track
Electives 
Thesis

Degree Requirements
Program requirements consist of 41-43 credit hours.  Core courses provide the student with the knowledge and skills required of crime laboratory analysts; elective courses, coupled with research experience, provide training in more specialized areas such as microspectrophotometry, firearm examination, microscopy and molecular biology, questioned documents.

Additional information.  Students, who enroll for the first time at the College in September 2008 or thereafter, must complete the program in the form presented in this bulletin.  Students, who enrolled prior to that date and have consistently maintained matriculation, may choose the form shown here or the version of the program in place at their time of enrollment.

All students are required to write a thesis.  There are no alternatives.

Required Courses                                                                  Subtotal: 24-27 credits

Forensic Science 706  Physical and Biological Evidence  
Forensic Science 707  Principles of Forensic Toxicology
Forensic Science 710  Advanced Criminalistics I
Forensic Science 721  Instrumental Analysis I
Forensic Science 722  Instrumental Analysis II
Forensic Science 730  Molecular Biology for Forensic Scientists† 
Forensic Science 795 Thesis Prospectus (1 credit)
Forensic Science 796 Thesis Prospectus (1 credit)
Forensic Science 797 Thesis Prospectus (1 credit)

† Not required for students in the Molecular Biology specialization

Criminalistics Track

Subtotal: 8 credits

Forensic Science 711 Advanced Criminalistics II
Forensic Science 717 Organic Compound Structure Determination

Molecular Biology Track                                                       Subtotal: 13 credits

Forensic Science 704  Advanced Genetics
Forensic Science 732  Advanced Molecular Biology I
Forensic Science 733  Advanced Molecular Biology II

Forensic Toxicology Track

Subtotal: 10 credits

Forensic Science 725 Forensic Toxicology I
Forensic Science 726 Forensic Toxicology II

Electives

Subtotal: 6 credits

In addition to required and specialization courses, students must also take 6 credits of electives, which should include any of the following courses and/or any other course numbered 800-899, which will satisfy the forensic science elective distribution requirements.

Forensic Science 705 Statistics for Forensic Scientists
Forensic Science 760 Evidence, Experts, and Ethics

                                                                                               Total: 41-43 credits