Key Infor­ma­tion:

• Grad­u­ates often take on roles that involve coor­di­nat­ing and man­ag­ing respons­es to emer­gen­cies and disasters.
• Oppor­tu­ni­ties exist in var­i­ous sec­tors, includ­ing gov­ern­ment agen­cies and pri­vate indus­tries.
• The degree equips indi­vid­u­als to antic­i­pate, strate­gize, and man­age respons­es to poten­tial haz­ards and dis­as­ters effectively.

Are you inter­est­ed in obtain­ing your bachelor’s degree in Emer­gency Man­age­ment and won­der­ing what you can do with an emer­gency man­age­ment degree?

If so, be cer­tain to answer these ques­tions as you decide which emer­gency man­age­ment aca­d­e­m­ic pro­gram would best fit your needs –

• What is an emer­gency manager?
• What can I do with a degree in emer­gency management?
• What is Emer­gency Management?

Those who grad­u­ate with a bachelor’s degree in emer­gency man­age­ment are respon­si­ble for coor­di­nat­ing the efforts to help orga­ni­za­tions and com­mu­ni­ca­tions antic­i­pate and pre­pare for poten­tial haz­ards or dis­as­ters. These types of jobs are avail­able in the gov­ern­ment sec­tor or pri­vate industries.

What is Emergency Management?

The con­cept of emer­gency man­age­ment began in 1979 with the devel­op­ment and cre­ation of FEMA – the Fed­er­al Emer­gency Man­age­ment Agency. It was at this time that sev­er­al fed­er­al agen­cies merged to cre­ate FEMA.

Emer­gency man­age­ment can be bro­ken down into three fun­da­men­tal inter­re­lat­ed categories –

• All Haz­ards – it has been shown that the same emer­gency pre­pared­ness plan can be effec­tive­ly applied to all emergencies.
• The Emer­gency Life Cycle – dis­as­ters occur over time in a series of cycles. Each cycle is matched with man­age­r­i­al phas­es that include – 
  • Strate­giz­ing against poten­tial haz­ards and disasters.
  • Mit­i­gat­ing poten­tial hazards.
  • Prepar­ing for Emer­gen­cies and disasters.
  • Respond­ing to Emer­gen­cies and nat­ur­al disasters.
  • Recov­er­ing from the effects of the emer­gency or the nat­ur­al disaster.
• The Emer­gency Man­age­ment Part­ner­ship – this facet of emer­gency man­age­ment has to do with coor­di­nat­ing emer­gency man­age­ment ser­vices. It requires the main­te­nance of part­ner­ships with agen­cies from many gov­ern­ment lev­els, plus the pri­vate and vol­un­teer­ing sectors.

School and Program Accreditation in Emergency Management

Accred­i­ta­tion is a stan­dard­ized process that requires third-par­ty pro­fes­sion­als – with the author­i­ty to per­form such a func­tion – to com­pre­hen­sive­ly assess the con­tents and deliv­ery of aca­d­e­m­ic degree pro­grams. Accred­i­ta­tion is an impor­tant func­tion of the edu­ca­tion sys­tem in the Unit­ed States.

The process of accred­i­ta­tion pro­vides stu­dents with the assur­ance that the edu­ca­tion they receive is the same as the edu­ca­tion promised by the school. Con­sid­er it a ‘gold star’ issued to the school by an approved accred­i­ta­tion agency.

In the U.S., there are a vari­ety of pro­grams and schools that offer train­ing and edu­ca­tion at a vari­ety of lev­els. One type of accred­i­ta­tion is per­formed by gov­ern­men­tal agen­cies. Oth­er types of accred­i­ta­tion are per­formed by pro­fes­sion­al over­sight agen­cies, that are very often approved by gov­ern­ment edu­ca­tion agen­cies or the indus­try itself. Pri­vate over­sight com­pa­nies eval­u­ate uni­ver­si­ties, pro­fes­sion­al schools, col­leges, and the aca­d­e­m­ic degree pro­grams they offer.

The accred­i­ta­tion process requires a com­pre­hen­sive eval­u­a­tion pro­ce­dure to deter­mine if the school or the aca­d­e­m­ic pro­gram meets the accred­i­ta­tion cri­te­ria that have been estab­lished by the gov­ern­ment or indus­try. The school or aca­d­e­m­ic pro­gram meets the accred­i­ta­tion cri­te­ria; the school is award­ed accred­i­ta­tion, which allows the school to inform poten­tial stu­dents that the school or the pro­gram has met the accred­i­ta­tion muster.

Ulti­mate­ly, it is the accred­i­ta­tion process’s objec­tive to make sure that stu­dents inter­est­ed in attend­ing a school under­stands that the school or pro­gram has been eval­u­at­ed to dis­cern if it meets accred­i­ta­tion standards.

The broad­est type of accred­i­ta­tion is region­al accred­i­ta­tion, which one of the nine region­al gov­ern­ment over­sight agen­cies per­forms. The more spe­cif­ic accred­i­ta­tion process is spe­cial­ized accred­i­ta­tion. Sanc­tioned over­sight agen­cies in each indus­try per­form spe­cial­ized accreditation.

Region­al Accreditation

The USDE – the Unit­ed States Depart­ment of Edu­ca­tion is the fed­er­al gov­ern­ment agency tasked with the respon­si­bil­i­ty of accred­it­ing schools and pro­grams through­out the coun­try. Each agency is tasked with the respon­si­bil­i­ty of admin­is­ter­ing to the school’s in a cer­tain based on the school’s pro­gram mer­it and con­tent. Over­all, most region­al­ly accred­it­ed high­er learn­ing insti­tu­tions are usu­al­ly state-fund­ed, not for prof­it, and aca­d­e­m­i­cal­ly oriented.

Spe­cial­ized Accreditation

Spe­cial­ized accred­i­ta­tion is award­ed to those aca­d­e­m­ic pro­grams or schools that meet cer­tain cri­te­ria estab­lished by experts in the field. Spe­cial­ized accred­i­ta­tion offers stu­dents a bit of assur­ance that the pro­gram they attend will prop­er­ly pre­pare them for a career in emer­gency management.

It is not­ed that spe­cial­ized accred­i­ta­tion vol­un­tary. Schools must proac­tive­ly choose to open their pro­grams and schools to accred­i­ta­tion offi­cials to eval­u­ate the school and program.

It is crit­i­cal for emer­gency man­age­ment stu­dents to rec­og­nize that when trans­fer­ring between schools while earn­ing a degree that the new school will much more read­i­ly accept any earned cred­its from accred­it­ed emer­gency man­age­ment schools. In fact, many schools do not per­mit cred­it trans­fers that have not been award­ed by an accred­it­ed college.

EMAP – The Emer­gency Man­age­ment Accred­i­ta­tion Program

The Emer­gency Man­age­ment Accred­i­ta­tion Pro­gram – EMAP, is a non­prof­it orga­ni­za­tion that oper­ates inde­pen­dent­ly by fos­ter­ing account­abil­i­ty and excel­lence in those pro­grams designed to offer aca­d­e­m­ic degrees in emer­gency man­age­ment. EMAP accom­plish­es these objec­tives by estab­lish­ing pro­fes­sion­al stan­dards that are applied to their accred­i­ta­tion procedure.

EMAP under­stands that emer­gency man­age­ment pro­grams are ide­al for coor­di­nat­ing resources in estab­lish­ing the finest emer­gency man­age­ment train­ing pro­grams. EMAP’s cri­te­ri­on is flex­i­ble enough to assess pro­grams of any size and is offered as a blue­print for emer­gency man­age­ment pro­grams of the future.

Ulti­mate­ly, EMAP assess­es those emer­gency man­age­ment pro­grams based on the program’s com­pli­ance with six­teen fun­da­men­tal areas that include –

• Resource Man­age­ment.
• Admin­is­tra­tion.
• Plan­ning.
• Exer­cis­es.
• Eval­u­a­tions.
• Train­ing.
• Warn­ing.
• Actions to cor­rect deficiencies.
• Com­mu­ni­ca­tions, to name a few.

It is not­ed that the Emer­gency Man­age­ment Accred­i­ta­tion Pro­gram – EMAP – is the only accred­i­ta­tion pro­vid­ed to those pro­grams designed for emer­gency man­age­ment majors.

Types of Emergency Management Degrees

Emer­gency man­age­ment pro­fes­sion­als are tasked with the respon­si­bil­i­ty of help­ing large pop­u­la­tions feel safe in the wake of a fire or earth­quake. Most emer­gency man­agers work in the field for a gov­ern­ment agency or non­prof­it direc­tor. So what is an emer­gency man­age­ment degree, and why do I need one?

At one time, the emer­gency manager’s role was to plan and be pre­pared to respond to emer­gen­cies. In fact, most emer­gency man­agers had back­grounds in law, fire, or the mil­i­tary – typ­i­cal­ly with tremen­dous field expe­ri­ence and training.

How­ev­er, recent­ly, the emer­gency man­age­ment pro­fes­sion has been slow­ly mor­ph­ing from a nar­row focus to a more mul­ti-lev­el pro­fes­sion that can encom­pass every­thing from risk man­age­ment to human resources. Because of cyber­at­tacks, infor­ma­tion tech­nol­o­gy experts are key to emer­gency man­age­ment. Because of these devel­op­ments, emer­gency man­age­ment pro­grams have been revamped to cre­ate a train­ing and edu­ca­tion­al pro­gram that meets the par­a­digm for the new­ly defined emer­gency man­ag­er. For­tu­nate­ly, there are many emer­gency man­age­ment online degrees or on-cam­pus pro­grams from which to select.

As a result, online emer­gency man­age­ment degrees offer both train­ing and hands-on expe­ri­ence to degree can­di­dates, who, when grad­u­at­ing, find gain­ful and reward­ing careers in a vari­ety of sub-spe­cial­ties. But, before one enrolls in an emer­gency man­age­ment online degree, it is essen­tial to con­sid­er which of the emer­gency man­age­ment degree con­cen­tra­tions would meet your edu­ca­tion goals.

For exam­ple, if you have an inter­est in work­ing full-time for a gov­ern­ment agency, a degree in emer­gency man­age­ment online with a pub­lic safe­ty con­cen­tra­tion would be a great choice. This con­cen­tra­tion for an emer­gency man­age­ment degree online would require a stu­dent to com­plete class­es learn­ing how to respond to nat­ur­al dis­as­ters, ter­ror­is­tic threats, or oth­er cat­a­stro­phes. Course­work in pub­lic safe­ty and pub­lic health will also delve deeply into how to man­age emer­gency plans for communities.

Let’s review some of the more pop­u­lar emer­gency man­age­ment degrees online and on-cam­pus pro­grams. With online pro­grams, you can study part-time while working.

Emer­gency Man­age­ment Degrees Online – Fire Science

Stu­dents who pos­sess a strong inter­est in a career as a fire­fight­er should con­sid­er the emer­gency man­age­ment con­cen­tra­tion of fire sci­ence. The field of fire sci­ence focus­es pri­mar­i­ly on the pre­ven­tion of fires and the pro­tec­tion of peo­ple from fire. A fire sci­ence degree in emer­gency man­age­ment online will include course­work in fire com­bus­tion, fire man­age­ment, fire analy­sis, and the prac­tices that lead to fire prevention.

Emer­gency Man­age­ment Online Degree – Home­land Security

The Depart­ment of Home­land Secu­ri­ty (DHS) is high lev­el gov­ern­ment agency – which is the rea­son why home­land secu­ri­ty emer­gency man­age­ment online degrees are one of the more pop­u­lar emer­gency man­age­ment focus­es. The DHS – the Depart­ment of Home­land Secu­ri­ty (DHS) is respon­si­ble for pro­tect­ing Amer­i­cans both at home and abroad. The DHS was cre­at­ed after the hor­rif­ic events of 9/11, with coor­di­nat­ing efforts by the Bor­der Patrol, the Navy, and oth­er relat­ed agen­cies. Course­work for a home­land secu­ri­ty con­cen­tra­tion will explore inves­ti­ga­tions, plus agents’ roles & responsibilities.

Emer­gency Man­age­ment Degrees Online – Dis­as­ter Relief

Most would agree that when you con­sid­er an emer­gency manager’s role, you think direct­ly about the tasks of a dis­as­ter relief pro­fes­sion. This is one of the rea­sons that dis­as­ter relief is one of the more pop­u­lar aca­d­e­m­ic tracks for those study­ing for one of the qual­i­ty online emer­gency man­age­ment degrees offered. A dis­as­ter relief pro­fes­sion is con­cerned direct­ly with the issues that occur before, dur­ing, and after a nat­ur­al dis­as­ter. Those study­ing for a dis­as­ter relief con­cen­tra­tion for an emer­gency man­age­ment degree will com­plete course­work to coor­di­nate med­ical help and sup­plies for those who are harmed or dis­placed by a hur­ri­cane or earth­quake. Pol­i­cy­mak­ers involved in dis­as­ter relief pre­pare gov­ern­ment agency plans for relief in the event of a disaster.

Online Degrees in Emer­gency Man­age­ment – Child Protection

The child pro­tec­tion empha­sis offered in some online degrees in emer­gency man­age­ment is an ide­al focus for those indi­vid­u­als who have a keen desire to work in the social work field and enjoy work­ing with chil­dren of any age. A child pro­tec­tion con­cen­tra­tion in an emer­gency man­age­ment pro­gram trains you to eval­u­ate a child’s needs and then to know how to find the resources to meet those needs. Class­es will also include work­ing with fam­i­lies in the juve­nile sys­tem using ther­a­peu­tic techniques.

License and Certification in Emergency Management

One of the most effi­cient & effec­tive tech­niques that can be used to advance with­in any career is to earn one of the industry’s licens­es or cer­ti­fi­ca­tions. This is true in the emer­gency man­age­ment field, where you can earn a cer­tifi­cate of emer­gency man­age­ment from a num­ber of pro­fes­sion­al organizations.

An emer­gency man­age­ment cer­ti­fi­ca­tion reveals to poten­tial employ­ers that you have met rec­og­niz­able cri­te­ria in the state in which they work. Many job descrip­tions or announce­ments will request that job can­di­dates hold an emer­gency man­age­ment cer­ti­fi­ca­tion, so if you need the emer­gency man­age­ment cer­tifi­cate to secure a cer­tain job, you will have the appro­pri­ate cer­ti­fi­ca­tion in emer­gency man­age­ment that you will need to apply.

Anoth­er way to view a cer­tifi­cate in emer­gency man­age­ment is to con­sid­er it one of the legit­i­mate ways to build your resume. There are sev­er­al nations emer­gency man­ag­er cer­ti­fi­ca­tion des­ig­na­tions from which to choose. These emer­gency man­age­ment cer­ti­fi­ca­tion options include –

• The Asso­ciate Emer­gency Man­ag­er (AEM) certification.
• The Cer­ti­fied Emer­gency Man­ag­er (CEM) certification.

Each of these emer­gency man­age­ment cer­ti­fi­ca­tion pro­grams is admin­is­tered by the Inter­na­tion­al Asso­ci­a­tion of Emer­gency Man­agers (IAEM), the largest nation­al asso­ci­a­tion in the emer­gency man­age­ment are­na. These are dis­cussed in detail below.

The AEM Cer­tifi­cate in Emer­gency Management

The Asso­ciate Emer­gency Man­age­ment (AEM) cer­tifi­cate of emer­gency man­age­ment is designed for those who have not met every require­ment of the Cer­ti­fied Emer­gency Man­ag­er cer­ti­fi­ca­tion but want to earn some type of cer­ti­fi­ca­tion. To earn an AEM cer­tifi­cate in emer­gency man­age­ment online the appli­cant must meet the fol­low­ing requirements –

• Have a min­i­mum of 100 hours in the field of emer­gency man­age­ment training.
• Pass a mul­ti­ple-choice test that encom­pass­es 100 questions.
• Sub­mit a writ­ten, com­pre­hen­sive essay detail­ing the applicant’s expe­ri­ence and skills in the field of emer­gency management.

The CEM Cer­tifi­cate in Emer­gency Management

The Cer­ti­fied Emer­gency Man­ag­er cer­ti­fi­ca­tion (CEM) is offered to those pro­fes­sion­als reach­ing for the pin­na­cle of their emer­gency man­age­ment careers. The pro­fes­sion­al who earns their cer­tifi­cate of emer­gency man­age­ment has reached the height of To earn this cer­ti­fi­ca­tion in emer­gency man­age­ment an appli­cant must meet the fol­low­ing requirements –

• Pos­sess suf­fi­cient expe­ri­ence as a pro­fes­sion­al emer­gency manager.
• Hold a valid bac­calau­re­ate-lev­el degree from an accred­it­ed insti­tu­tion of high­er learning.
• Have a doc­u­ment­ed emer­gency man­age­ment train­ing of at least 100 hours.
• Have the abil­i­ty to ver­i­fy that the emer­gency man­ag­er cer­ti­fi­ca­tion can­di­date has con­tributed to the emer­gency man­age­ment indus­try on a min­i­mum of six dif­fer­ent occa­sions. These con­tri­bu­tions can include pro­fes­sion­al mem­ber­ships, the author­ing of arti­cles relat­ed to emer­gency man­age­ment, or speak­ing engage­ments, to name a few.
• Sub­mit a writ­ten, com­pre­hen­sive essay detail­ing the applicant’s expe­ri­ence and skills in the field of emer­gency management.
• Pass a mul­ti­ple-choice test that encom­pass­es 100 questions.

Emer­gency Man­age­ment Cer­ti­fi­ca­tion Online

It is not­ed that emer­gency man­age­ment cer­ti­fi­ca­tion pro­grams are avail­able online. Stu­dents inter­est­ed in obtain­ing their emer­gency man­age­ment cer­ti­fi­ca­tion online are advised to do their due dili­gence to ensure the emer­gency man­age­ment cer­tifi­cate pro­gram they choose meets their edu­ca­tion and career objec­tives. These cer­ti­fi­ca­tion in emer­gency man­age­ment pro­grams are also offered through a hybrid deliv­ery of coursework.

Careers in Emergency Management: What Can You Do with an Emergency Management Degree?

Emer­gency man­age­ment degree jobs exist all over the world, and emer­gency man­age­ment entry-lev­el jobs are com­pet­i­tive. Job open­ings are filled quick­ly. As you con­sid­er your emer­gency man­age­ment career path it is impor­tant to remain focused on these rel­e­vant questions –

• What does an emer­gency man­ag­er do?
• What can i do with an emer­gency man­age­ment degree?
• What kind of entry-lev­el emer­gency man­age­ment jobs can I expect?
• Are there any sug­gest­ed career tips for emer­gency man­age­ment degree candidates?
• What does an emer­gency man­ag­er job descrip­tion say?
• How does emer­gency man­age­ment job descrip­tion dif­fer from that of an emer­gency man­age­ment spe­cial­ist job description?
• Are there jobs in emer­gency man­age­ment that would meet my career objectives?
• Is it pos­si­ble to pur­sue an emer­gency man­age­ment con­sul­tant with an online degree?
• What are the avail­able pri­vate sec­tor emer­gency man­age­ment jobs?
• What are my options regard­ing avail­able careers in emer­gency management?
• What are my options for careers in dis­as­ter and emer­gency management?
• How does an emer­gency man­age­ment direc­tor job descrip­tion dif­fer from that of an emer­gency man­age­ment coor­di­na­tor job description?

Emer­gency man­agers should under­stand that cer­tain indus­tries that employ the largest num­ber of emer­gency man­agers are as follows –

• State, fed­er­al, and local gov­ern­ment agencies.
• Sur­gi­cal or Med­ical hospitals.
• Emer­gency Relief Services.
• Hous­ing Agencies.
• Elec­tric pow­er plants.
• Com­mu­ni­ty Food Banks and Agen­cies, to name a few.

Job titles for those with emer­gency and dis­as­ter man­age­ment careers may dif­fer depend­ing on whether the posi­tion is one of the pri­vate emer­gency man­age­ment jobs or gov­ern­ment-based emer­gency man­age­ment ser­vices jobs. If you want a fed­er­al job, head to Wash­ing­ton, DC.

For instance, those with emer­gency man­age­ment careers in the pri­vate indus­try may find that their emer­gency man­age­ment spe­cial­ist career title is a busi­ness recov­ery plan­ner or a pub­lic safe­ty specialist.

It’s cru­cial that job seek­ers devel­op their com­mu­ni­ca­tion skills to increase their employ­ment oppor­tu­ni­ties. Risk mit­i­ga­tion in an emer­gency sit­u­a­tion depends on being able to express what is need­ed clear­ly and under pressure.

Examples of Jobs in Emergency and Disaster Management

As you con­sid­er the many avail­able dis­as­ter and emer­gency man­age­ment careers – look into job post­ings for these pop­u­lar careers in emer­gency management.

• An Emer­gency Man­age­ment Specialist
• A Safe­ty Specialist
• An Emer­gency Response Team Lead
• A Dis­as­ter Recov­ery Man­age­ment Specialist
• An Envi­ron­men­tal Health & Safe­ty Specialist
• A Direc­tor of Emer­gency Services
• A Hur­ri­cane Pro­gram Specialist
• An Envi­ron­men­tal Safe­ty Man­age­ment Specialist
• A Pre­pared­ness Admin­is­tra­tor for a Hos­pi­tal or Agency
• An Emer­gency Plan­ner for Nuclear Events

Jobs in Emergency Management by Industry

While the emer­gency man­age­ment careers not­ed below do not reflect entry-lev­el emer­gency man­age­ment jobs, this indus­try data pro­vides insight into the top-pay­ing jobs for emer­gency man­agers. To under­stand how to strive towards this pin­na­cle of emer­gency man­age­ment career suc­cess, it is impor­tant to start by read­ing an emer­gency man­ag­er job descrip­tion carefully.

The indus­tries that con­tain the high­est con­cen­tra­tion of employ­ment for emer­gency man­agers include the following –

Emergency Management Salary

Accord­ing to the sta­tis­ti­cians at the fed­er­al government’s Bureau of Labor Sta­tis­tics, there were more than 9.750 emer­gency man­age­ment pro­fes­sion­als work­ing in the Unit­ed States dur­ing 2019. In addi­tion, the BLS notes that the medi­an emer­gency man­age­ment jobs salary for 2019 was $74,590.

The emer­gency man­age­ment degree salary range is as fol­lows –

• At the low end of the emer­gency man­age­ment salary scale, the annu­al wage is $40,430 per year.
• At the high end of dis­as­ter and emer­gency man­age­ment salary scale is $141,230 per year.

Top pay­ing met­ro­pol­i­tan areas that offer the high­est emer­gency man­age­ment degree salary include -

Top pay­ing states that offer the high­est emer­gency man­age­ment degree salary include -

Top pay­ing non- met­ro­pol­i­tan areas that offer the high­est emer­gency man­age­ment degree salary include -

Professional Organizations in Emergency Management

A pro­fes­sion­al orga­ni­za­tion is typ­i­cal­ly ded­i­cat­ed to sup­port­ing and serv­ing the inter­ests of the pro­fes­sions in a par­tic­u­lar field.

• The Inter­na­tion­al Asso­ci­a­tion of Emer­gency Man­agers (IAEM) – this pro­fes­sion­al orga­ni­za­tion oper­ates across the globe and is ded­i­cat­ed to the pro­mo­tion of emer­gency man­age­ment principles.
• The Inter­na­tion­al Asso­ci­a­tion for Pre­pared­ness and Response (DERA) – this pro­fes­sion­al orga­ni­za­tion helps emer­gency man­age­ment pro­fes­sion­als, orga­ni­za­tions net­work with oth­er dis­as­ter pre­pared­ness and emer­gency man­age­ment professionals.
• The Asso­ci­a­tion of Health­care Emer­gency Pre­pared­ness Pro­fes­sion­als (AHEPP) – this pro­fes­sion­al orga­ni­za­tion is com­mit­ted to the advance­ment of the dis­as­ter pre­pared­ness and response field.
• The Nation­al Emer­gency Man­age­ment Asso­ci­a­tion (NEMA) – this pro­fes­sion­al orga­ni­za­tion offers mem­ber­ship to emer­gency man­age­ment professionals.
• The U.S. First Respon­ders Asso­ci­a­tion (USFRA) — this pro­fes­sion­al orga­ni­za­tion oper­ates a non-prof­it social net­work for pro­fes­sion­als who are police offi­cers, mil­i­tary, fire­fight­ers, EMS, and civil­ian sup­port members.
• The Nation­al Infor­ma­tion Offi­cers Asso­ci­a­tion (NIOA) – this pro­fes­sion­al orga­ni­za­tion offers mem­ber­ship to North Amer­i­can emer­gency ser­vice gov­ern­ment emer­gency ser­vices professionals.