EMTA Curriculum

Students will be required to complete five courses for the Graduate Certificate, including four core courses and an elective.

The four core courses are:

• EMTA 401 Introduction to Emergency Management Analysis
  This course provides the history, terminology, goals and mission of the Emergency Management occupation and profession. Strategic analysis of the roles, responsibilities, lines of authority and characteristics of effective program managers are presented. Emphasis is placed on decision-making models and tools and management and leadership principles. Professional associations, federal support programs, model state practices and functional activities are also discussed. Students are presented with models of public sector and private sector emergency management approaches, contemporary issues and best practices.

• EMTA 402 Threat and Vulnerability Assessment
  This course provides the student with the information and processes to conduct vulnerability and threat assessments from threats posed by natural and man-made disasters. Subject areas include: severe weather threats, geologic events and biological events, unintentional and intentional man-made disasters, and infrastructure failure. The activities involved in identifying, assessing, and analyzing threats using multiple processes, models and practices are presented. Case studies and best practices from public and private sectors are presented and analyzed. Analysis of geographic threats and specific mitigation, deterrence and resilience strategies are also presented and discussed.

• EMTA 403 Building Resilience through Mitigation
  This course provides the student with the information and details to assess, plan and implement mitigation strategies for a community or business. Mitigation includes all activities that improve a community or business' survivability from an identified threat. The objectives of this course include understanding how to identify needs, obtain financial and political/corporate support and execute mitigation programs. Specific mitigation strategies for flooding, earthquakes and product tampering are presented. New products and methods of construction and retrofit will be discussed in this course. The use of insurance as a risk transfer methodology is also presented.

• EMTA 404 Critical Infrastructure Protection
  This course provides the student with the information and details to identify, plan, implement and evaluate a critical infrastructure protection program for a community or business entity. Critical Infrastructure Protection includes all the activities to prevent, deter and minimize the overall risk to critical infrastructure including people, assets, systems, networks, and functions, and their interconnecting links, from exposure, injury, destruction, incapacitation, or exploitation. Developing and sustaining multiple strategies to best protect against the risks at hand are discussed and evaluated. The hardening of "soft targets" in public and private sectors is presented. An orientation to the Department of Homeland Security's Critical Infrastructure Protection Job Aid will also be presented and utilized in problem solving and research activities.

Students choose one of two available electives depending on their desired focus:

• EMTA 405 Community Contingency Planning
  This course provides the information and details to develop and critically assess a community or corporate disaster plan. Topics of discussion include: developing a disaster plan for a company or community, developing a hazard analysis and capability assessment, building consensus, leveraging political assets to insure community readiness, the process of adoption, and analysis / revision. Review and comparison of multiple community and business continuity plans are presented for analysis and synthesis.

• EMTA 406 Emergency Management Response & Recovery
  This course provides the student with the information and details of coordinating, operating, and critically assessing a community emergency operations center (EOC). Best practices and new government processes and standards are presented, considered and discussed. Case studies involving after-action reviews and lessons learned from a variety of sources will be studied for comparison and analysis. Specific processes to coordinate the resources of a community or company, develop strategic objectives, develop tactical work plans and create an incident action plan that is compliant with the National Incident Management System (NIMS) will be presented. A discussion of the operational requirements of an EOC is presented. This course also provides the student with the information and details of making the transition from response to recovery to a community or company disaster. Case studies examine mass fatality management, earthquakes, flooding and terrorism incidents.