Global Security and Intelligence Studies Volume 2, Issue 1, Fall 2016 | Page 21

Academic Intelligence Programs in the United States
Measures of this kind would seem a necessary step for the sort of waiver system
promoted by James G. Breckenridge (Breckenridge 2010). Such steps would also be a
good complement to what Carl J. Jensen has suggested on a collegiate intelligence corps
(Jensen 2011). One can imagine practical limits and reasons not to do these things—
for example, many enrolled students would not likely end up in the IC. However, such
measures could help those students who do go on to intelligence careers better develop
and retain key skill sets, while also inculcating the shared language, understanding,
and identity that initiatives like Analysis 101 are meant to accomplish (but may not,
for example, if intelligence agencies opt not to participate).
However, there will likely be instances when intelligence educators resist
the teaching of certain analytic tradecraft, even if it is endorsed by the IC. As
Chang and Tetlock have pointed out, IC training may not reflect the most current,
complete understanding of analytic process and related insights (for example, from
psychology) (Chang and Tetlock 2016). Thus, intelligence curricula and educators can
likely maintain instruction and coursework more continually up-to-date than their
professional counterparts. This will raise awareness and skills in intelligence analysts
that may be missing in IC-wide and agency-specific training. Speaking to this sort
of independence, one of our respondents told us that their approach to instruction
on intelligence analysis is “not drawn from the IC’s understanding of how to do
intelligence analysis.”
Even across specific INTs and analytic positions, there are unifying frameworks
and techniques that are applicable. It may be in the successful use those frameworks
and techniques that more robust analysis will emerge—or not, in their absence. These,
for example, could include the IC’s Analytic Tradecraft Standards, which certainly have
some critical roots in social science methodology. It is a possibility that the particulars
and technicalities of the specific INTs could serve to obscure the use of the more
broad, underlying facets of analytic tradecraft. And as Bruce and George have written,
analytic training is quite varied in the IC and could be prone to underemphasizing
certain content and approaches (Bruce and George 2015).
A key, then, is finding an appropriate middle ground between training and
education, and then within training and tradecraft, in academic programs. It is toward
this middle ground that this article has sought to help us move; although as more
specialized intelligence degrees emerge in areas like geospatial and cyber intelligence,
this navigation and balance will be further challenged. Again, the full realization of
the benefits afforded by academic intelligence programs will depend on how these
programs are designed. It is very difficult to imagine a graduate degree in geospatial
intelligence analysis that does not get heavily into training and tradecraft.
We believe that conventional education and training can be melded in ways
that do not erode either, but in fact strengthen both. Other professions employ such an
approach (Finckenauer 2005), and a more purposive combination should come with
long-term professional development and performance benefits. The input from the 10
intelligence educators we spoke with, on net, tended to agree. Of course, there were
different views about the degree to which programs should take on a more professional
coloring, with some seeing their role as providing needed foundations and others as
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