Best Criminal Justice Schools in Louisiana (2027)

The Bachelor of Science in Criminal Justice at Louisiana State University of Alexandria in Alexandria, Louisiana, covers courts, corrections, juveniles, and law enforcement, and LSUA offers it on campus or 100% online. LSUA says most courses in its 100% online accelerated programs run in 7-week cycles. The Criminal Psychology concentration looks at behavioral motivations and special populations within the justice system, and the department says its criminal justice faculty work each year with a law school to provide LSAT testing strategies and sample testing.

LSUA admits first-year students who are high school graduates and have not attended a college, and also takes transfer students from community colleges and other universities. The department says up to 15 specified credit hours may be awarded to students who have completed a police academy, and up to 9 to those who completed Introduction to Correctional Techniques through the Federal Law Enforcement Training Center.

Louisiana State University Shreveport, in Shreveport, Louisiana, awards the Bachelor of Criminal Justice (B.C.J.) with concentrations in CJ Generalist, Security Studies, Forensic Science and Political Science. The generalist concentration looks at the judicial process, the Supreme Court, the analysis of crime and social response; security studies points toward cybercrime, counterterrorism and homeland security; the science-oriented forensic concentration covers the police process and physical evidence through courses like Criminal Investigation, Analytical Chemistry and Chemical Equilibrium; and the political science concentration runs from criminal law to urban politics. Course topics across the major include community policing, juvenile delinquency, international security, cybercrime, terrorism, profiling, gangs in America and women in crime. LSUS lists the program's availability as in person.

LSUS estimates four years to finish for first-time freshmen. Students can apply classroom learning in an internship, join Alpha Phi Sigma, the criminal justice honor society, and take part in a historical arrest project in which students have transcribed and analyzed 50 years of handwritten arrest records since 2010. Courses are taught by faculty who held careers in the criminal justice field, and criminal justice majors can qualify for additional scholarships within the History & Social Sciences Department.

The degree totals 120 credit hours, and its major courses include Introduction to Criminal Justice, The Police Process, The Criminal Courts, The Corrections Process, Introduction to Research Methods, Criminal Behavior, a 6-credit-hour Internship in Criminal Justice and a Senior Seminar. The department says lower-level courses introduce the components of the criminal justice system while upper-level courses analyze areas such as management, comparative criminal justice, research methods and community crime prevention, with courses on courts, restorative justice, homicide, terrorism and forensics, and the catalog's plan adds a modern language sequence completed in a single language and an eighteen-hour minor in an appropriate area. Online students choose 8-week or 16-week courses delivered 100% online.

For the online program, first-time freshmen provide high school transcripts and ACT, SAT or Accuplacer scores or a 3.0 overall high school GPA, and transfer students need an associate degree or at least 24 college credit hours with a cumulative GPA of 2.25 or higher and completed freshman English and college algebra. The online page says students should have completed or be eligible to enroll in Math 105 and ENGL 101, or they may not be able to complete the degree fully online; online students can enroll in January, March, June, August or October, and the online program may not be available in every state or to F-1 international students. Seniors complete a semester-long internship with a local agency, and placements include municipal, parish, state and federal criminal justice agencies.

The Bachelor of Science in Criminal Justice at Nicholls State University in Thibodaux, Louisiana, is a 120-hour degree. Nicholls says it addresses the six content areas recommended by the Academy of Criminal Justice Sciences (administration of justice, corrections, criminological theory, law adjudication, law enforcement, and research and analytic methods) along with diversity and ethics, and it centers coursework on law enforcement and security issues tied to wetlands, coastal, and maritime concerns. The university lists the degree among those available through Nicholls Online, whose classes run in an accelerated 8-week format.

Students with an Associate of Science degree are eligible to enter the program at the junior level, and the online program page describes the degree as custom-made for associate degree transfer students completing the four-year B.S. Students who start as freshmen take general education courses and the criminal justice principles courses first. Nicholls Online is aimed at adult learners and charges no out-of-state fees to its students.

Northwestern State University's Bachelor of Arts in Criminal Justice is a 120 semester hour curriculum with 66 semester hours in the major, covering law enforcement, the legal system, and corrections along with required sociology, political science, and English or organizational leadership courses. Students can add the Pre-Law and Paralegal Studies concentration of 21 semester hours.

Freshmen are admitted under the university's minimum admission criteria for in-state, out-of-state, and home-schooled students. The catalog says students in the degree who have completed the Louisiana Police Officer Standards and Training (P.O.S.T.) Council requirements for the police academy receive credit for CJ 1100, 2300, 2500, 2600, and 3360, and an accelerated BA/MS program links the degree with a Master of Science in Homeland Security.

The program studies the components and processes of the American justice system, including criminology and human behavior, and focuses on the relationship between crime, the criminal justice system and society. Its stated learning outcomes cover applying critical thinking to criminal justice processes and policies, the role and mission of police, ethics in criminal justice practice, the impact of policing, courts and corrections, patrol, investigative and case preparation techniques, the criminal court system's pre-trial and post-trial process, and the organization and administration of criminal justice agencies. Fletcher offers the degree 100% online in its 8-week session format.

Fletcher has an open-admissions policy: anyone above the age of 16 can be fully admitted after submitting an application, providing proof of selective service registration where Louisiana law requires it and meeting the state's immunization requirements. The program prepares students for law enforcement careers and also serves students who intend to transfer to a four-year college or university as criminal justice majors, and a full-time student can complete the associate degree in two years. Fletcher Online students pay the same rate regardless of where they live, and the program page says scholarships are available.

BRCC's catalog sets both degrees at 60 total program hours. The A.S. plan includes Introduction to Criminal Justice, Ethics in Criminal Justice, Police Systems and Practices, Court Systems and Practices, Corrections Systems and Practices, Criminal Law and the Criminal Justice Internship, along with English Composition I and II, American History 1865 to Present, Introduction to Psychology, Race Relations, general education requirements and criminal justice electives such as Constitutional Law, Juvenile Delinquency, Criminology and Crime Scene Investigation. A.S. students need a cumulative GPA of 2.00 or better and a C or better in all major courses and in English 1013 and 1023, and the catalog lists BRCC Mid City, a Baton Rouge, Louisiana campus, as the location of both programs.

BRCC has an open-door admissions policy: graduates of a state-approved high school, home-schooled students in approved programs and people who have obtained a GED or High School Equivalency are eligible, though admission to the college does not ensure admission to a particular program of study. The A.S. prepares students for criminal justice work in municipal, parish and state agencies, courts and other public and private agencies, offers a course of study for students who plan to transfer to a four-year criminal justice program, and serves workers already in the field. The Associate of Arts in Criminal Justice is part of the Associate of Arts Louisiana Transfer Degree program; BRCC's catalog says a Louisiana Transfer degree meets, in full, all lower-division general education requirements at Louisiana's public universities and that graduates who transfer with it are assigned junior status.

Graduates earn 60 hours of college credit, combining criminal justice courses such as Introduction to Criminal Justice, Criminal Evidence and Procedure, Criminal Law and Juvenile Justice with English composition, public speaking or interpersonal communication, mathematics, Computer Concepts, national or state and local government, and science, psychology, sociology and humanities electives, plus criminal justice electives. BPCC's catalog says the degree can be obtained 100% via Internet instruction and is also available in an accelerated twelve-month online format of three semesters; the accelerated courses cover in four or eight weeks what a regular sixteen-week semester covers, and BPCC's accelerated programs are fully online except Speech 110, whose speeches must be presented on campus. A Medicolegal Death Investigation concentration, designed for students considering work in medicolegal death investigation or a law enforcement agency's investigation branch, adds courses such as Criminalistics, Medicolegal Death Investigation, Pathophysiology and Loss and Death.

BPCC says its accelerated programs are designed for working adults who have never attended college or who attended but did not finish, and applicants submit an official high school transcript; students can begin the 12-month format in the fall, spring or summer semester and must follow its designated schedule of classes. BPCC gives peace officers who completed Louisiana POST (Police Officers Standards and Training) Council training 15 hours of credit in criminal justice courses, and students may submit prior academic credit or prior learning for review. In-state tuition rates apply to all of BPCC's online courses, and the college also offers a Criminal Justice technical diploma and certificates of technical studies in Corrections, Criminal Justice Investigation and Police/Community Relations.