RIT to offer online courses in enterprise security

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Rochester Institute of Technology is helping to fill the nation’s gap in security professionals with new online courses aimed at teaching enterprise security policy and management.

The multidisciplinary courses take an all-encompassing approach to security, looking at both the digital and physical ways that individuals, organizations and nations can protect themselves.

With an expertise in enterprise security, graduates can address a wide variety of challenges associated with natural disasters, nation-state military conflicts, terrorism and crime. In just the past three years, national demand for enterprise security professionals has grown by 68 percent, according to a 2015 Education Advisory Board study.

“Today, security is on everyone’s mind and there is a lot of concern about it,” said Sam McQuade, a professor in RIT’s Department of Public Policy and creator of the courses. “We need professionals who are able to look at security from every angle in physical places and cyber spaces.”

The five online courses will provide students with the critical thinking, problem solving and ethical reasoning skills needed to develop policies and manage organizations for enterprise security broadly defined. The graduate-level classes are currently being offered as electives or as a concentration for students in many related degree programs.

“Enterprise security policy management is an expansive concept that pulls from many academic and career fields,” said McQuade. “The skills students will learn can be used in everything from criminal justice and computing security to architecture and urban planning.”

An expertise in enterprise security could also benefit people seeking careers in facilities management and project management, environmental protection and sustainability, health and human services administration, management information systems, disaster preparedness and emergency response, risk management and continuity planning, auditing and regulatory compliance, legal studies and international relations, public administration and public policy.

The eight-week long accelerated courses are offered through the College of Liberal Arts and RIT Online. The five enterprise security policy and management courses include:

• Security Technology Management
• Security Policy, Law and Ethics
• Managing Cyber Threats and Critical Information
• Security Enhanced Environmental Design
• Internal Organizational Security Management

RIT’s College of Liberal Arts is in the process of qualifying the courses toward an Advanced Certificate in Enterprise Security Policy and Management. Approval by the New York State Education Department of this advanced certificate is expected in 2017.

“In the future, we also hope to open these courses to undergraduate students as electives and as an immersion or minor,” said McQuade.

For more information about RIT’s courses in enterprise security, go to rit.edu/ritonline/espm.