60 credit hours

The Associate of Arts degree with an emphasis in Criminal Justice provides general academic courses and electives which enable students who intend to major in criminal justice to transfer to a college or university which offers baccalaureate degrees in criminal justice. Students planning to transfer will have a solid foundation upon which to build as they pursue further studies in criminal justice.

The Field of Study (FOS) curriculum for Criminal Justice includes 15 credit hours of lower-division course work, which will transfer and apply to baccalaureate criminal justice programs at all public universities in Texas. Universities offering equivalent courses at the upper-division level will substitute the lowerdivision level courses for the upper-division ones, unless they can demonstrate substantial and significant difference in the content of the upper-division courses.

The FOS includes the five specified courses listed below. Students may also add an additional six credit hours of course work from the “Recommended Electives” which may be transferred by local agreement to the university or which may be required by the receiving university, as long as the additional course work does not duplicate content already covered in the other FOS courses.


Career Options
Criminal Justice graduates are academically prepared for entry-level positions in law enforcement, court services, and corrections at the local, state, and federal levels of government. Through classroom and laboratory experiences, students acquire the fundamental knowledge and skills necessary to understand the criminal justice system and its agencies, personnel and functions. Challenging career opportunities await graduates at all levels of government as:

     Corrections Officers Law Enforcement Officers and Investigators
     Probation Officers and Parole Officers
     Victim Services Counselors
     Youth Service and Juvenile Court Officers

Note: The second digit in a course number indicates the number of credit hours
for that course.