With the new Criminology Department added over the summer, Penn faculty members are already working towards designing a major.
While the major has not yet been approved, ideas are flying about its format.
"This major will provide 100 percent research apprenticeship experience -- which will be required -- to emphasize research training for undergraduates," said Criminology Department Chairman Lawrence Sherman, an Albert M. Greenfield professor of human relations and professor of sociology.
The department was authorized by the University Board of Trustees on June 20, but it does not yet offer a major since the department has not yet reached "a critical mass of faculty," Sherman said.
When that number is reached -- next year at the earliest -- those faculty members will have to design a major and propose it to the full faculty body of the School of Arts and Sciences. If the proposal is accepted, the department will start to hire new personnel and design courses aimed specifically at undergraduate students.
Provisions for the major will include prerequisites in statistics, anthropological fieldwork and archival research, so that future criminology majors will be "prepared to do research -- to dedicate themselves to this liberal art," Sherman said.
The new department will be devoted exclusively to criminology -- the science of crime at large -- while forensics -- the science of criminal profiling -- will be left out.
With three years of steady enrollment in the introductory course, professors are foreseeing a high degree of popularity among undergraduate students.
"I think criminology has proven itself to be an area that is appealing to students -- especially those in the social sciences," Center for Research on Religion and Urban Civil Society Director Byron Johnson said. "I think it will be a big hit at Penn."
The decision to appoint Sherman -- who has taught an introductory course for undergraduates for the past three years -- as chairman of the first Criminology Department in a major research university was well-received by many.
"I am very excited that Larry Sherman will be the person who is going to direct this ship," Johnson said.
Doctoral students -- who will likely be employed as teaching assistants -- have said that they too are satisfied with this choice.
"Larry Sherman is so motivated and enthusiastic about everything," criminology doctorate student Reagan Daly said. "He is brilliant."
While plans for a major are still only on paper, Sherman has already decided the direction he wants this department to take.
"The whole department is focused on understanding the patterns and prevention of crime," Sherman said.
He added that the department will strengthen the doctoral program -- introduced at Penn in 2000 -- while giving undergraduate students a chance to do focused research in this field.
"We don't have the resources to create a very strong criminology program unless we have a department," Sherman said.
To explain the need for such a department, Sherman cited the exponential growth of interest that this discipline has attracted in the last decades.
"Criminology has increased its body of knowledge by 10,000 percent in my lifetime," Sherman said. "The demand for criminology research from governments around the world has grown so that I am now doing more research outside the U.S. than inside."
With the creation of this department, Sherman's goal is to lead criminology at Penn to the top spot in the doctoral program rankings by the National Academy of Science -- its next review is released in 2010.
