The JTAC (Stephenville, Tex.), Vol. 200, No. 4, Ed. 1 Wednesday, February 13, 2019 Page: 4 of 7
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2.6.19
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The Road Less
Traveled
Holly Tucker
Feb.24 | 2:00pm $15
/
Bring your own six pack and enjoy the show!
^GMHBUW
LIVE
Get Your Tickets At:
TheNewGranburyLive.com
Francisco Castro
Contributor
sw_castro@tarleton. edu
12-1 PM
FEBRUARY 19 & 26
STUDENT CENTER, RM 27
A LIGHT LUNCH WILL BE SERVED
a live-audience version of the Defining Audacity Radio Show
with Drew Myers featuring Texas singer songwriter
Aerial over view of the design for the new Tarleton Forth Worth campus.
Photo Courtesy of Tarleton State University
STUDENT
SUCCESS
tarleton.edu/studentsuccess
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F 2.6.19
Feature
Following the approval from The Texas
A&M University System, Tarleton State
University will be inducting its first ever
PhD degree program in the history of the
institution. This Doctor of Philosophy in
Criminal Justice is set to begin its first
class in Fall 2019 at the Tarleton State
University Fort Worth campus as part
of the School of Criminology, Criminal
Justice and Strategic Studies within the
College of Liberal and Fine Arts.
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This new program carries a lot of
significance to the university and to
the school, but to Dr. Alex del Carmen,
Associate Dean for the College of Liberal
and Fine Arts and Executive Director
of the school, there is more to it than
it being the first of its kind within the
university.
“The PhD is focused towards
practitioners, it has the working
professional in mind,” del Carmen said.
According to del Carmen, the planned
scheduling of the courses begin on the
weekends and in the evenings on the
weekdays. This allows for police officers,
probation officers and any individual
involved in the field of Criminal Justice
interested in the degree to enroll in the
courses without it interfering with their
current profession.
It is with this notion in mind that
gives purpose for the PhD program to
be offered at the Fort Worth campus.
According to del Carmen, the Fort Worth
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have about what they’re doing.”
At the end of the day, del Carmen and
his colleagues carry the hope that this
program will not only make an impact on
Tarleton but within the field of Criminal
Justice.
“I think [The PhD program] opens the
doors for other programs at Tarleton to
seek a PhD. I think Tarleton will continue
to evolve as an academic institution
under the leadership of Dr. [F. Dominic]
Dottavio and Dr. [Karen] Murray. In
terms of legacy, I think it allows for
our discipline to grow. Often times, we
find ourselves in the discipline that
is a part of the paradigm of the 21st
century. We are at the forefront of the
fight to preserve liberty and the pursuit
of happiness, we are at the forefront of
the preservation of the constitution.
We are at the forefront of being able
to keep our community safe. There are
faculty members that have spent day and
night with me and working very hard
metroplex houses many law enforcement
agencies whose staff could benefit from
only having to travel to the Fort Worth
campus to attend the courses.
“The PhD itself is going to have a
criminal justice orientation. When the
individual recipient of the doctoral
program graduates, he or she will
graduate with a PhD in Criminal Justice”
del Carmen said. “Criminal Justice is...
[an] applied science. We wanted to
specifically make it a PhD in Criminal
Justice because we felt that a practitioner
component is important.”
The practitioner component del
Carmen speaks of revolves around the
practical field experience the faculty
members within the school carry with
them. This experience includes faculty
members who have acted as probation
officers, served as agents and leadership
within divisions of the FBI and operated
as federal monitors who have overseen
police reform cases.
“We have a lot of field experience and
we feel very strongly that the academic
side combined with the field experience
gives us the unique perspective to better
educate our students and to not only
talk about the theory [of criminology]
but also talk about the application of it.
The idea is its going to be about real-
life applications using the theoretical
framework,” said del Carmen.
These faculty members also carry
with them various recognitions for their
published academic work, ranging from
recognition within the academic field
to being recipients of Fulbright Scholar
titles.
“These are very prestigious awards that
are given, recognizing us for the work
that we do. People like Dr. [Tara] Shelly,
Dr. [Rhonda] Dobs and Dr. [Stephanie]
Ryon are the kinds of individuals that
will be teaching in our program that are
well published, incredibly well regarded
and cited in the academic world,” del
Carmen said.
While the PhD program is accessible
to individuals dedicated to the career
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Tarleton’s first PhD program to enhance Criminal Justice field
to get this PhD approved. What drives
us to do it was a gift that we will leave
behind other generations that are going
to have better educated criminal justice
practitioners that will hopefully prevent
some of these [criminal] events that
happen and also help resolve crime,” said
del Carmen. “At the end of the day, we are
looking for those things that will make
a difference to your generation, your
children generation and their children’s
[and] make it a safer community. If we
start at it, start putting people out there
with advance degrees that are going to
make smart choices, that are going to
know where to find the answers, that are
not going to be insular in the way that
they approach an issue, that are going
to be extensive, that are going to be
broader, that are going to think with a
balanced mind. I think we’re going to be
addressing crime in a different way, and
therefore be safer.
field, criminal justice encompasses
a unique discipline that ties in the
theoretical and the practical and is
backed by distinguished faculty who have
mastered in such field, the degree is only
attainable to the individuals who are able
to excel in the program.
“The doctoral requirements will be
very serious. We are essentially going to
train somebody to...be a researcher, to
be a scholar, to be [able to] go into an
academic world where they’re going to be
expected to teach, to research, to opine
various things, to be a subject matter
expert,” del Carmen said. “In order to do
that, it’s a very intense three-and-a-half
[to] four-year process that takes place
where the individual comes in with a
master’s level education and leaves with
the aptitude of a person with a PhD.
“A PhD is not a right, it’s a privilege,”
del Carmen said. “It’s an opportunity to
be a doctor, be a subject matter expert in
the area. We expect them to demonstrate
to us that they have the aptitude, that
they have the time, that they have the
commitment and the intellect to be able
to finish their PhD.”
While the PhD program will require a
lot from himself and his colleagues in the
school, del Carmen is grateful to be in
the position he is in.
“It is a privilege to be in a position to
educate doctoral students and what we
hope to accomplish is to see the fruit of
our labor. To see individuals graduate
with PhD’s that will go out there and
change the world. It’s like I always say to
people...We serve those that serve,” said
del Carmen. “So we [as Criminal Justice
educators] are at the service of those
that serve the community. For me, it’s an
honor and a privilege that we’re going
to be educating america’s heroes. Those
that spend Christmas Eve in a patrol car
or those that risk their lives [so that we]
can be here today. We hope that [PhD
graduates] leave our university with not
only the spirit of Tarleton but we also
hope that they leave the university with
the knowledge and the passion that we
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The JTAC (Stephenville, Tex.), Vol. 200, No. 4, Ed. 1 Wednesday, February 13, 2019, newspaper, February 13, 2019; Stephenville, Texas. (https://texashistory.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metapth1179194/m1/4/: accessed June 2, 2024), University of North Texas Libraries, The Portal to Texas History, https://texashistory.unt.edu.; crediting Tarleton State University.