---
title: "Criminal Justice and Law Enforcement Teacher, Postsecondary"
description: "Teach courses in criminal justice, corrections, and law enforcement administration. Includes both teachers primarily engaged in teaching and those who do…"
canonical: "https://nuecareer.com/careers/criminal-justice-and-law-enforcement-teacher-postsecondary"
last-updated: "2026-10-09T10:57:55.138Z"
---

# Criminal Justice and Law Enforcement Teacher, Postsecondary

**Category:** Educational Instruction and Library · **SOC code:** 25-1111 · **O\*NET-SOC code:** 25-1111.00

Teach courses in criminal justice, corrections, and law enforcement administration. Includes both teachers primarily engaged in teaching and those who do a combination of teaching and research.

Also advertised as: Adjunct Instructor; Adjunct Professor; Assistant Professor; Associate Professor; Criminal Justice Instructor; Criminal Justice Professor; Digital Forensics Instructor; Instructor.

## At a glance

- **Median annual wage:** $76,590 (BLS OEWS, May 2025)
- **Median hourly wage:** Not published by BLS
- **Wage range (10th–90th percentile):** $45,000 to $140,240, with the middle half between $60,020 and $100,870
- **Total US employment:** 13,150
- **Typical entry education:** Doctorate
- **Preparation required:** Considerable preparation — O\*NET rates this "Job Zone Five: Extensive Preparation Needed"
- **Projected growth:** +1.5% over 2025–2035 (BLS EP, 2025–2035)
- **Annual job openings:** 1,100 openings a year
- **AI-resilience score:** 27/100 — a NueCareer heuristic over O\*NET work activities and context, not a BLS or O\*NET figure

## Pay

National wage distribution, BLS OEWS, May 2025, across 13,150 US jobs.

| Percentile | Annual wage |
| --- | --- |
| 10th | $45,000 |
| 25th | $60,020 |
| 50th (median) | $76,590 |
| 75th | $100,870 |
| 90th | $140,240 |
| Mean (average) | $87,550 |

### Pay by state

The 15 highest-paying states, by median annual wage. The cost-of-living-adjusted column divides the state median by that state's BEA Regional Price Parity, so the columns answer different questions: the first is what the job pays there, the second is what that pay buys there.

| State | Median annual wage | Cost-of-living adjusted | Employment |
| --- | --- | --- | --- |
| CA | $139,720 | $126,192 | 1,460 |
| CO | $122,050 | $118,435 | 370 |
| MD | $99,600 | $94,894 | 220 |
| PA | $94,710 | $97,067 | 790 |
| OR | $93,960 | $90,905 | 70 |
| RI | $84,270 | $82,391 | 70 |
| MN | $83,060 | $84,221 | 100 |
| NY | $82,770 | $76,695 | 880 |
| LA | $82,100 | $93,077 | 70 |
| WI | $81,890 | $87,029 | 300 |
| DE | $80,510 | $80,665 | 40 |
| IA | $79,690 | $90,802 | 80 |
| MA | $79,500 | $75,172 | 380 |
| NH | $79,190 | $76,024 | 40 |
| MS | $78,520 | $90,302 | 110 |

26 more states with published wage data are omitted here. The full table for all 41 states is at https://nuecareer.com/careers/criminal-justice-and-law-enforcement-teacher-postsecondary/salary-by-state, or as JSON at https://nuecareer.com/api/v1/careers/criminal-justice-and-law-enforcement-teacher-postsecondary.

## Outlook

BLS projects employment to move from 15,700 in the 2025–2035 base year to 15,900 by the end of the cycle — a gain of 200 jobs, or +1.5%. Slower than average: 1.5% against 3.5% projected for all occupations over the same cycle. About 1,100 openings a year are expected on average, counting openings from growth as well as from workers leaving the occupation permanently. Source: BLS EP, 2025–2035.

## How to get in

- **Typical entry education:** Doctoral or professional degree (BLS Employment Projections).
- **Preparation level:** Considerable preparation — O\*NET's preparation band for this occupation is "Job Zone Five: Extensive Preparation Needed".
- **Related work experience typically required:** None.
- **Typical on-the-job training:** None.

### Education people in this job actually hold

O\*NET surveys incumbents, so this distribution describes who is in the job today and can differ from the BLS entry requirement above.

| Education level | Share of workers |
| --- | --- |
| Master's Degree | 38.9% |
| Doctoral Degree | 25.6% |
| Post-Secondary Certificate | 10.9% |
| Post-Master's Certificate | 8.6% |
| Associate's Degree or other 2-year degree | 8.4% |
| Bachelor's Degree | 4.3% |

## What the work involves

- Prepare and deliver lectures to undergraduate or graduate students on topics such as criminal law, defensive policing, and investigation techniques.
- Initiate, facilitate, and moderate classroom discussions.
- Evaluate and grade students' class work, assignments, and papers.
- Maintain student attendance records, grades, and other required records.
- Prepare course materials, such as syllabi, homework assignments, and handouts.
- Write letters of recommendation for students.
- Plan, evaluate, and revise curricula, course content, course materials, and methods of instruction.
- Compile, administer, and grade examinations, or assign this work to others.

## Skills and knowledge

### Essential skills

- Speaking — importance 4.8 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Active Listening — importance 4.1 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Critical Thinking — importance 4.1 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Reading Comprehension — importance 4.0 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Writing — importance 4.0 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Active Learning — importance 4.0 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Learning Strategies — importance 4.0 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Monitoring — importance 3.9 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale

### Transferable skills

These are the skills that carry into other occupations, and they drive the related-occupation and career-change rankings on this site.

- Instructing — importance 4.0 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Judgment and Decision Making — importance 3.6 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Social Perceptiveness — importance 3.1 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Complex Problem Solving — importance 3.1 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Systems Analysis — importance 3.1 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Time Management — importance 3.1 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Service Orientation — importance 3.0 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Coordination — importance 2.9 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale

### Knowledge areas

- Education and Training — importance 4.5 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- English Language — importance 4.5 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Law and Government — importance 4.5 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Public Safety and Security — importance 4.4 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Customer and Personal Service — importance 3.9 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Computers and Electronics — importance 3.8 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale

### Abilities

- Oral Expression — importance 4.1 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Oral Comprehension — importance 4.0 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Written Comprehension — importance 4.0 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Written Expression — importance 4.0 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Speech Clarity — importance 4.0 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Inductive Reasoning — importance 3.9 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale

## Who it suits

O\*NET rates every occupation on the six Holland (RIASEC) interest areas, on a 1–7 scale. This occupation's strongest areas are Social (S), Investigative (I), Conventional (C).

| Interest area | Score (1–7) |
| --- | --- |
| S — Social | 6.85 |
| I — Investigative | 4.88 |
| C — Conventional | 3.56 |
| E — Enterprising | 3.37 |
| A — Artistic | 3.33 |
| R — Realistic | 2.40 |

### Personality fit

These scores are **derived by NueCareer**, not published by any government agency: they are cosine similarities between a personality type's trait profile and this occupation's O\*NET interest and work-style ratings, expressed 0–100. Treat them as a starting point for exploration, not as evidence that a type belongs in a job.

| Type | Fit score (0–100) |
| --- | --- |
| ENFJ | 72.2 |
| ENFP | 66.9 |
| INFJ | 65.8 |
| ESFP | 62.7 |
| ESFJ | 62.0 |

Best-fitting types: ENFJ.

## Related occupations

O\*NET's primary related occupations, in its own ranked order.

- [Law Teacher, Postsecondary](https://nuecareer.com/careers/law-teacher-postsecondary) — median $128,500
- [Sociology Teacher, Postsecondary](https://nuecareer.com/careers/sociology-teacher-postsecondary) — median $84,290
- [Political Science Teacher, Postsecondary](https://nuecareer.com/careers/political-science-teacher-postsecondary) — median $98,070
- [Education Teacher, Postsecondary](https://nuecareer.com/careers/education-teacher-postsecondary) — median $75,350
- [Social Work Teacher, Postsecondary](https://nuecareer.com/careers/social-work-teacher-postsecondary) — median $77,570
- [Library Science Teacher, Postsecondary](https://nuecareer.com/careers/library-science-teacher-postsecondary) — median $80,340
- [Psychology Teacher, Postsecondary](https://nuecareer.com/careers/psychology-teacher-postsecondary) — median $80,340
- [Business Teacher, Postsecondary](https://nuecareer.com/careers/business-teacher-postsecondary) — median $99,080
- [Family and Consumer Sciences Teacher, Postsecondary](https://nuecareer.com/careers/family-and-consumer-sciences-teacher-postsecondary) — median $75,870
- [Communications Teacher, Postsecondary](https://nuecareer.com/careers/communications-teacher-postsecondary) — median $78,580

## Sources

- **O\*NET** — O\*NET 31.0 Database, August 2026. https://www.onetcenter.org/database.html
- **BLS OEWS** — BLS Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics, May 2025. https://www.bls.gov/oes/
- **BLS EP** — BLS Employment Projections, Table 1.2, 2025–2035. https://www.bls.gov/emp/
- **BLS OOH** — BLS Occupational Outlook Handbook, 2025–2035 edition. https://www.bls.gov/ooh/
- **BEA RPP** — BEA Regional Price Parities by State, 2024. https://www.bea.gov/data/prices-inflation/regional-price-parities-state-and-metro-area

---

This bank includes information from the O\*NET 31.0 Database by the U.S. Department of Labor, Employment and Training Administration (USDOL/ETA). Used under the CC BY 4.0 license (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/). O\*NET® is a trademark of USDOL/ETA. NueCareer has transformed the data by joining it to BLS wage and projection data and deriving facet, personality-fit and AI-resilience scores. BLS and BEA data are public domain (17 U.S.C. §105).

O\*NET content is used under [CC BY 4.0](https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/). How these figures are sourced and derived: https://nuecareer.com/careers/methodology

JSON representation of this page: https://nuecareer.com/api/v1/careers/criminal-justice-and-law-enforcement-teacher-postsecondary