A criminal justice degree prepares some grads for private-sector work

Sam Surber actually began as a music education major when she first entered college at the University of Akron. “I was torn on my major,” she explains. “I was between music education and criminal justice. Part of me wanted to be a police officer. Part of me wanted to be a music educator. Total polar opposites.” Having spent her whole life in performing arts and musical ensembles, it was important to Surber to preserve her love of melody, but studying her passion in pursuit of a career started to affect her personal appreciation for music. So she decided to keep music as a serious hobby and switch her major to criminal justice. And because the University of Akron was in a moment of transition regarding its criminal justice program, that meant a move down south to UC, which she understood had a nationally renowned program. “That was something that I already had on my radar.”  

She calls her enrollment in UC “by far the best decision I made in my undergraduate academic career” because, in the criminal justice program, she was able to foster her love for helping people alongside the investigative mindset she appreciated so much. She did two policing internships and planned to go into law enforcement before she learned she had other career options.

“A lot of us in asset protection found it by accident,” says Surber. “It's just kind of something we fell into.” In her case, finding the career path started with a part-time job at Target, where the asset protection team leader approached her with an offer. “He said, I understand you're a criminal justice major. Would asset protection be something that you're interested in?” she says. “And I transparently said, I have no idea what asset protection even is, but I'm really interested in learning more about it.”

Her co-worker provided an overview, and, seeing Surber was fascinated, encouraged her to apply for an entry-level security specialist job and receive the company’s asset protection training. She did, got the loss prevention job, and discovered she really loved the work. “It totally opened my eyes to a different area where I could still help people and serve, just in a different capacity,” she says. “I had no idea that there was a private sector you could do that in, and it didn't just have to be the public sector.”

Following graduation, she knew she wanted to double down on her interest in loss protection and asset management, so she accepted a loss prevention specialist role with Amazon, where she’d work for the next four years and be promoted to site lead and eventually manager. “Amazon is more of a fulfillment operation than physical stores,” she says. “I wanted to see what that piece looked like.”

She took advantage of Amazon’s support for continuous improvement, learning about larger scale issues like workplace violence, business continuity and crisis management. “Every time I've transitioned into a new role, it's just opened my eyes to a whole new sector of what AP is,” she says.

Morgan Viant originally intended to study forensics at Miami University, committing to the institution the same year that program was eliminated; she ultimately found herself studying chemistry for a year. “Organic chemistry, all year long,” she says with a laugh. She did enjoy chemistry but craved career applications in her studies, so she checked out a meeting focused on criminal justice work. Viant had done an internship with the U.S. Marshalls in high school thanks to a connection from a family friend—she helped out with high-level cases and nonprofit fundraising initiatives—and decided the criminal justice academic track would be a better option for her.

“I ended up loving it, obviously.”

With two siblings at UC, Viant checked out the university and discovered its nationally renowned Criminal Justice program. Noting the opportunities presented by UC’s urban campus and high-profile internship and co-op program, she transferred to the university’s College of Education, Criminal Justice, Human Services, and Information Technology.

“I don't think there was one class that I didn't love. I think all of the professors, all of the courses there—they are amazing,” she says. “Because I went to UC and I did that specific program, it really made me become more passionate about what I want to do and be like, OK, this is actually the career path for me. I can’t see myself doing anything else.”

While earning her Bachelor of Science in Criminal Justice, Viant explored numerous career options. She did an internship with the Cincinnati Police Department, as well as an internship with a private investigator. She also worked with Manchek on field placement, resume presentation and interview preparation. “I was fortunate enough to have those resources, especially UC and specifically Sarah.”

Before her final year of college, she received a LinkedIn message with an intriguing opportunity. “Someone reached out to me from Target and was like, hey, I think you'd be great for this. If you just want to do like a quick interview with us, you can see what we're all about.” The interview was for a store assets protection executive internship that ran over the summer, and Viant leapt at the opportunity.

“At the end of the internship, you have a test, and I was fortunate enough to have passed,” she says. During her senior year she worked part-time as a Target security specialist then, upon graduation, was immediately hired to the asset protection team leader position she holds today. “Right out of college, they were like, all right, let's get started.”

While there was once a time she’d enter a store without giving thought to loss prevention professionals working behind the scenes, today she leads an asset protection team for Target in Florence, Kentucky. And while she’s aware some people may view her job as simply catching shoplifters, Viant sees the work as an opportunity to meet people where they are and offer help.

“When we do stop someone, our main thing is, what's the why behind it?” she explains. “My boss says all the time, we know the where, the when and the how it was done, but we don't know why it was done. So we want to try to figure out if it was financial or if there's anything that we can provide. If it's food, then we give them resources or take them directly to the shelter down the street. That's what led me into criminal justice.

“Here in this job, you need to lead with empathy 100 percent of the time. You never know what someone's going through.”

The work is fulfilling and speaks to the values that drew Viant to criminal justice in the first place. She’s planning to return to UC in the near future to earn a Master of Science in Criminal Justice, and she thinks she'll likely pursue the corporate fraud area of asset protection at some point in her career. But for now she’s pleased to be doing work she loves and, more importantly, helping people with her criminal justice training.