eyond the immediate horror of it all, the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks left Americans with a realization of the sheer vulnerability of thousands of municipalities across the land-from the largest cities to the tiniest towns. How do you protect the populace from further attacks when virtually any burg or byway might be a target?

As a public-policy matter, America's response to 9/11 represents the most complex coordination challenge the nation has ever faced. Its centerpiece has been the establishment of the Department of Homeland Security, whose task is to somehow mesh more than 87,000 different governmental jurisdictions with security responsibilities at the federal, state, and local level.

"It's a new entity, kludging together 170,000 people from 22 agencies," says William Banks, professor of public administration and law, and director of Syracuse University's Institute for National Security and Counterterrorism. "Some of the agencies and personnel have roles and missions that are new to them. They are being told to work with people and agencies that they traditionally kept at arm's length or ignored."

"The bureaucracy isn't new, but the challenge is that people have to learn new ways," says Montgomery Meigs, a retired four-star general who, as the Louis A. Bantle Chair in Business and Government Policy, functions as a key member of Maxwell's national-security faculty. "People are familiar with old ways and they have to have open minds. These are new threats and the people who are charged with responding to them must be flexible with their bureaucratic loyalties."

But who are these people, charged with responding to new threats? It's an evolving, sprawling population-people in Homeland Security, yes, but also in the Pentagon and in State; plus, people at the many consulting firms and contractors who do work for those departments. It also includes some state, regional, and local leaders-though relevance and implementation at the local level are patchy.

Meanwhile, Maxwell has created and will continue to develop a supplemental curriculum in security studies. "No doubt, homeland security has a profound effect throughout the public sector," says Dean Mitchel Wallerstein '72 M.P.A., a former U.S. deputy assistant secretary of defense for counterproliferation policy who teaches in the security program. "But there are many departments and many professionals involved. Our best hope, as educators, is to provide concepts and background that inform security work happening today, in all its many forms."

Renee de Nevers, an assistant professor of public administration who teaches courses on international security and the proliferation of W.M.D.s, says there is a body of conceptual knowledge that anyone working in or around security ought to have. "I think, in our courses, we take this approach: If you were setting security policy, what would you need to know and who would you be dealing with? The answers to those questions represent the kind of education anyone in this field needs."

hen he became dean, Wallerstein recognized the need to address new kinds of security issues, related to U.S. interests at home and abroad. At that time, the School's only formal security-studies activity was a midcareer non-degree program for professionals in defense and related fields. The national-security content in graduate degree programs-particularly the M.P.A.-was not formally organized.

"When I arrived, the School's professional degree programs did not have depth in national security," Wallerstein says. "If Maxwell were to continue to lead as a school of public affairs, I felt that shortcoming needed to be remedied."

Since then, two related curricular enhancements have taken hold. First, the M.P.A. degree now includes an optional concentration in International and National Security Policy; a comparable program is offered in the international relations program. Second, a certificate of advanced study in security studies has been established, via the Institute for National Security and Counterterrorism (INSCT); like all such certificates, this is available to any Maxwell graduate student-in fact, any Syracuse University graduate student-who meet its 12-credit requirement.

The security-policy concentration in public administration attracts lots of attention. "There's a much greater interest in the security side of government than there was four years ago," Meigs said. "This program is already among our most popular."

This fall, classes included U.S. National Security and Foreign Policy; Global Issues: Drugs, Crime and Terrorism; International Security; the Asymmetrical Uses of Force; and Crisis Management. Such courses seek to give an understanding of motivating factors behind the profound changes recently seen in security and terrorist activities.

"The world is a much different place than it was up through the 1990s," says Melvyn Levitsky, professor of international relations and public administration, who teaches three classes in the security curriculum. "On the domestic front, national security used to mean looking primarily at issues such as nuclear weapons proliferation, more than unpredictable, seemingly individual acts of terrorism committed by people who fully expect to die in a blaze of what they see as heroic glory."

De Nevers points out that the concentration supplements the M.P.A. or I.R. curriculum. Public-management skills remain the bedrock of any professional degree program at Maxwell. But the security curriculum, she says, "nicely complements Maxwell's existing strengths in training students for government service."

he final piece of the security emphasis is the aforementioned Institute for National Security and Counterterrorism, which was seeded at the Syracuse University College of Law, as an outgrowth of Banks' specialty in security law. Last year, it was redefined as a joint enterprise of both Law and Maxwell. INSCT is Syracuse University's first interdisciplinary institute, addressing an array of public-administration and policy aspects of national security.

Faculty members from a range of disciplines bring experience in military planning and operations; global counterterrorism and arms control policy; counterproliferation policy; diplomacy and international relations; and terrorist methods and psychology.

INSCT's research portfolio ranges from faculty-supervised student working papers and research reports, to significant articles and books for academic journals and presses, to sponsorship of major workshops and conferences designed to further a research agenda in security or terrorism. While all INSCT research advances knowledge in the field, many of these projects are conducted on behalf of or in consultation with agencies, municipalities, and other public entities.

All this has been achieved in two years-a new concentration in public administration and international relations, a new interdisciplinary concentration, and the new institute combining the national-security resources of the Maxwell School and the College of Law. Things are moving quickly.

"These are the challenges we answer to," says Dean Wallerstein. "Just as our stakeholders in the public sector are forced to move quickly to meet the needs of homeland and international security, so must we. These problems are at the top of the national policy agenda, and the preparation of our professional program graduates is our contribution to the national response."

                                                                                     —Louise Hoffman Broach / Dana Cooke