DISTANCE LEARNING | CONTINUING EDUCATION | ONLINE DEGREES

College professors will be the first to tell you that their lives are boring. They don’t usually find themselves in critter-infested catacombs, duking it out with rabid Nazis or fighting supernatural beasts. They don’t find themselves becoming the victims of their own research, gaining superhuman powers in the process. They especially don’t find themselves in the arms of beautiful, cosmopolitan women. I mean, let’s face it: these guys make a living teaching half-conscious college kids and either reading others’ research or producing their own. They get more involved with spreadsheets and computer models than they do with any damsels in distress.

1. Indiana Jones, The Indiana Jones Quadrilogy

2. Peter Venkman, Ghostbusters I & II

3. Charles Xavier, The X-Men Trilogy

4. Sherman Klump, The Nutty Professor I & II

5. John Nash, A Beautiful Mind

6. Emmett Brown, The Back to the Future Trilogy

7. Mickey Rosa, 21

8. Robert Langdon, The Da Vinci Code

9.  Professor Kirke, The Chronicles of Narnia

10. Alan Grant, Jurassic Park I & III

Do you like to show up at crime scenes with a fake badge and pretend you’re CSI’s Grissom? Do you have a closetful of Columbo-style trenchcoats just waiting for their day in the sun? If so, the Department of Labor has great news!

Careers in criminal investigation are looking better than ever, even with a recession looming. In fact, security careers, which include criminal investigators, were listed recently in Yahoo!’s list of “recession-proof” careers. It makes sense. Criminals don’t take a break when the economy slumps; and neither do criminal investigators.

Fortunately, if you’re willing to get rid of your fake badge and go back to school, criminal investigation careers are easier to get into than ever.

	Top Online Schools
	Kaplan University University of Phoenix Penn Foster Devry University AUI Online

Criminal investigators gather the facts, collect the evidence, and build the cases to put criminals behind bars. Vital to law enforcement, investigators use advanced surveillance techniques and computer databases to stop illegal activity, provide evidence for prosecution or defense teams, protect assets, and help find missing people. They conduct interviews, examine records, observe suspects, and participate in raids and arrests. Criminal investigators tend to specialize in areas such as computer crime, forensic psychology, crime analysis, crime scene investigation, and fraud examination.

Fortunately, the criminal investigations industry is expected to increase in size, despite the economic downturn. As drug- and computer-related crimes rise and our society becomes more security-conscious, job opportunities for criminal investigators will continue to increase. Individuals with Criminal Investigation degrees can choose from various jobs, from police detective to corporate investigator to loss prevention agent. They can expect to make, on average, between $45,000 and $80,000 with great benefits, stability, and plentiful opportunities for advancement.

Best of all, criminal investigation degrees can be obtained in relatively little time and with minimal investment. New online degree programs are allowing more future criminal investigators to get their careers in less time and on their own schedule, most in two to four years.

Third-graders hatching murder plots? Teenage girls beating a fellow student and then posting video of the attack on the internet? Students jump school teachers with no recourse from the district? Since when did this become commonplace? Since when did kids have the gall to plan the stuff out and broadcast it? Since when did we become so weak as to let them without so much as a slap on the wrist? Kids need to learn lessons, and the most important lessons aren’t about math, history, or science.

	Top Online Schools
	Kaplan University University of Phoenix Penn Foster Devry University AUI Online

Federal investigators seem to have their hands full nowadays. They’re not just putting away drug lords and crooked execs. Just as often, they seem to be catching politicians. Their newest catch, New York Governor Eliot Spitzer, was a doozy. Spitzer had a previously squeaky clean record, a reputation as a crusader, a do-gooder, and a tough prosecutor. Accidentally, the governor was discovered to have been involved with a high-profile prostitution service and boom! The media was saturated with the story of a call girl named Kristen, the brief press conference, Spitzer and his wife’s heartbroken faces.

What must it be like to be one of those federal investigators? One day, you’re just checking out the governor’s dealings, suspecting possibly shady activities, maybe bribery. Next thing you know, you follow his money trail to a premium call girl service, accounts of a scandalous night at a Washington hotel. Without meaning to, you have revealed Spitzer to be morally askew, a hypocrite to everything he stood for. When you come home, your wife asks you, "So, what did you do at work today?" You answer, "I accidentally brought down the governor of New York."

	Top Online Schools
	Kaplan University University of Phoenix Penn Foster Devry University AUI Online

Some people really enjoy this sort of thing. I have a friend who is a police officer. With satisfaction, he tells me about people he pulls over, scumbags he hauls off to jail, doors he kicks in. For him, he is a servant of the law. Bringing people to justice is the highlight of his day. He deals with the most pitiful, irresponsible, dim-witted, ill-intentioned people in our society, and he enjoys it. Obviously, not a job for everyone.

You can bet that law enforcement careers will always be a growing segment. As populations grow and people do stupid things, the justice system will rely on having increasing numbers of people to investigate and bring them in to be prosecuted. That means that if you have the desire to catch bad guys, there will almost always be a position for you to fill. For example, it doesn’t look like we’ll run out of careless politicians any time soon. And that’s a pretty good position to be in (for law enforcement officials, not politicians).

If you’re interested in starting a law enforcement career, feel free to look into getting your degree. If you have something to say about the fall of Eliot Spitzer, sound off below…