Another First For Mercyhurst! School Of Intelligence Studies and Information Sciences Announced Today!

Tom Ridge, Former PA Governor and first Secretary of Homeland
Security, speaks at the opening of the School of Intelligence
Studies and Information Sciences

Today, Mercyhurst University announced that the Department of Intelligence Studies would be merged with the Department of Math and Computer Science and the Department of Communications to form the seventh school within the University:  The Tom Ridge School of Intelligence Studies and Information Sciences.

Named after former Pennsylvania governor and first Secretary of Homeland Security, Tom Ridge, the new school takes its place among more traditional schools such as the School of Social Sciences and the School of Business...

(Sounds like a damn press release.   If your readers wanted that, they should go here.  You should give them a feel for what this really means...)

This is a big deal.  A really big deal.

In the first place, there is no other University in the country (perhaps in the world) that has a school dedicated to a vision of Intelligence Studies as an applied discipline, that teaches students how to get intelligence done and not just how to talk about it.

Secondly, it is going to allow us to grow our programs exponentially.  First up is a new and complementary masters degree that will focus on data analytics - so-called "big data". My own hope is that we will soon begin to offer a doctorate - but not a PhD - in Applied Intelligence.  I don't know what the new Dean of the School, Dr. Jim Breckenridge, wants it to look like, but I want it to be a professional doctorate, like an MD or a JD, that will focus not only on intelligence analysis but also on the special challenges of leading and managing the intelligence enterprise.

Third, it validates the vision of Bob Heibel, the founder of the Mercyhurst program.  Twenty-two years ago, long before 911, before even the first World Trade Center bombing in 1993, Bob had the radical idea that academia could do a pretty good job educating the next generation of intelligence analysts.  Almost 1000 students have graduated from our residential, online degree, or certificate programs since then.  These alumni are today employed throughout the national security, business and law enforcement intelligence communities.

Governor Ridge said today that the nation owes a debt of gratitude to Bob for what he has contributed to the safety and security of the US and, through our international students, of the world.  It is a testament to what one person can do when he really believes in something.

Teaching High School Students To Be Intel Analysts (Goerie.com)

The Erie City Schools, in cooperation with the Institute Of Intelligence Studies here at Mercyhurst, recently announced that they would begin to offer an intelligence analyst track in one of their high school career academies.

The full news article is here but there is more to this story. This is another one of Bob Heibel's visionary initiatives and it appears to me to be a natural extension of the increasing number of colleges and universities that are offering intelligence courses or even full programs.

While this may sound a bit too visionary for some, let me put it into perspective. We are in the middle of a study that is trying to get at the size, in dollars and people, of the "real" intelligence community. This real community includes all the law enforcement analysts and intelligence professionals in business as well as those in the national security community.

Our initial estimates indicate that there are as many analysts in the US national security community alone as there are petroleum engineers in the entire US (17,000). Our rough estimate suggests that, when you add in all of the law enforcement, competitive intel and other analysts in the business community, the total number of intel analysts in the US doubles. This exceeds the number of chemical engineers (30,000) in the country.

According to the American Institute of Chemical Engineers, the chemical engineering profession, however, has nearly 150 colleges and universities feeding it qualified graduates and STEM programs have become a staple offering in virtually every high school in the country. In contrast, there are only a handful (a growing handful but still a handful...) of colleges and universities offering even introductory intel courses, much less a full four year program.

Nearly 20 years ago, Bob started the Mercyhurt program based on a single insight: If the government can depend on academia to educate its entry level doctors and lawyers, engineers and architects, computer specialists and military officers, why can't it depend on academia to provide entry level education to its intelligence analysts? In this light, extending this vision to the high school level makes it seem less radical -- in fact, it looks downright logical.