A criminal justice degree allows students to draw upon areas of study such as criminology, forensic science, law and criminal justice, and the sociology of deviance. Students are able to choose a number of core and elective units that examine criminal law and procedures, policing, prisons and punishment, forensic science, transnational organized crime, theories of crime, rural crime, crime prevention, Indigenous over-representation and juvenile delinquency. The degree also offers students the opportunity to undertake training in research methods and provides hands-on-experience within the criminal justice system. Criminal Justice graduates can seek employment in a wide-range of sectors, including: border control, correctional facilities, crime prevention agencies, government and policy agencies, intelligence and security, juvenile justice, police service and welfare.

Criminology is the study of crimes, criminals, crime victims, theories explaining illegal and/or deviant behavior, the social reaction to crime, the effectiveness of anti-crime policies and the broader political terrain of social control. Therefore criminology involves research to discover what really happens in the streets, in police stations and courts, behind prison bars, in board rooms, and on battlefields. Its practitioners are likely to engage in the systematic evaluation of the effectiveness of criminal justice policies and proposals, as well as the discovery of the socio-cultural, economic and global roots of crime, rates of crime and meaning of crime, or the diverse ways of measuring criminal activity and its impact. Criminologists typically collect and analyze data sets that may be quantitative, for example statistical studies on the rise and fall of crime rates, and/or qualitative, for example ethnographic studies on street subcultures and drug use.

In the United States, individuals are given many rights and liberties that are safeguarded in the Bill of Rights. This places our justice system in a difficult but fascinating dilemma. How does the system balance individual liberty with the need for order? Order is certainly essential, but not at the expense of our rights and liberties. The criminal justice system is, therefore, held accountable to treat individuals equally and with "due process." Our social system benefits when this accountability is appreciated and acted upon by criminal justice practitioners.

Our graduates are prepared for a wide range of careers (almost too numerous to mention here!) in the criminal justice arena at the local, county, state, and federal levels, as well as numerous opportunities in the private sector. Many graduates go on to law school or graduate school. Graduates can also be found working in the social welfare field, business, and in regulatory agencies such as the Environmental Protection Agency and the Occupational Health and Safety Administration, among other areas.