The George Washington University School of Business will launch a new Master of Business Administration degree focused on security technology transition under an agreement with the U.S. Department of Homeland Security.
GW will offer the degree to 75 DHS-affiliated students, grouped in three cohorts, as well as students from other federal and state agencies and the private sector. The program is part of a new DHS Center of Excellence, which the GW School of Business will lead.
The M.B.A. in Security Technology Transition program will be a professional M.B.A. program including 12 core courses, seven courses on security and technology transition topics—such as federal acquisition programs and moving technology from research and development to operations—and two experiential learning courses. The program will include a robust co-curricular element, featuring professional development workshops, a mentorship program and networking opportunities in different structured formats.
The M.B.A. in Security Technology Transition program will launch in January 2021.
Richard Donnelly, a GWSB associate professor and chair of the Department of Information Systems and Technology Management, will be the program’s faculty director.
“This is exciting news that demonstrates GWSB’s ability to leverage its Washington location to partner with the federal government to create cutting-edge, in-demand, academic programming that is available nowhere else,” GWSB Dean Anuj Mehrotra said. “Securing the contract with DHS and creating this new program is a testament to GWSB’s commitment to academic customizability, flexibility and accessibility.”
GWSB will establish a security and technology industry advisory council to coordinate support for the program from DHS, private industry and GW. Courses will take place both on GW’s Foggy Bottom campus and online.
Students will apply with the same admissions standards as the regular School of Business graduate program application process and are subject to the same application requirements as GWSB’s professional M.B.A. program. In addition to the new degree program, the School of Business offers five undergraduate degrees, five other M.B.A. program formats, 13 specialized master’s degrees and 25 graduate certificate programs.
The new School of Business program is the second time GW has joined a DHS Center of Excellence.
The GW Program on Extremism joined the National Counterterrorism Innovation, Technology and Education Center of Excellence earlier this year. DHS Centers of Excellence are managed by the DHS Science and Technology Directorate’s Office of University Programs, which oversees several university-led consortia that were established by the Homeland Security Act of 2002. The centers work with industry, DHS, other federal, state and local government and homeland security agencies and first responders to develop critical technologies and analyses and to ensure a vibrant and capable national security workforce.
