Tuesday panel features loss prevention experts
Criminal Justice professor named to international advisory committee
Loss prevention professionals from major retail companies will discuss their work Tuesday in a panel discussion sponsored by the Criminal Justice Honor Society and the Professional Edge Center.
Open to the UIndy community and the public, “What Is Loss Prevention?” begins at 2 p.m. in Schwitzer Student Center’s UIndy Hall A. Experts from Sears, Amazon, Office Depot, Walgreens and Lowe’s will answer questions and discuss their work and the future of the industry.
This fall, UIndy’s Department of Sociology & Criminal Justice added a new minor and Criminal Justice bachelor’s degree concentration in Loss Prevention, one of the nation’s first such programs in a career field expected to grow 12 percent by 2022. Though the work is rooted in anti-shoplifting efforts, it has grown into a diverse profession that works proactively on issues such as crime prevention, employee safety, data protection, supply chain integrity and crisis management. Practitioners range from specialists for individual retailers to independent consultants to managers and executives for major corporations.
Dr. Kevin Whiteacre, associate professor and department chair, developed the new program in collaboration with The Loss Prevention Foundation, an international trade organization. Under that partnership, students in the concentration graduate with the foundation’s nationally recognized Loss Prevention Qualified accreditation, and they benefit from job fairs and guaranteed interviews with employers recruiting loss prevention professionals.
In related news, Whiteacre has been named to the foundation’s Academic Committee, joining representatives from universities across the United States and the United Kingdom to advise the foundation on academic issues and outreach to college students.
“Kevin has clearly demonstrated his commitment to elevating our profession by his recent implementation of a loss prevention concentration, said foundation President Gene Smith, LPC. “Partnering with LPF on that project clearly demonstrated his genuine support in our continued efforts to develop educational standards, industry-specific curricula and strategies to increase the level of awareness for our profession.”
More details on UIndy’s Loss Prevention program are available here. For more information on the Tuesday panel discussion, contact Dr. Whiteacre at whiteacrek@uindy.edu or (317) 788-4929.