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Preface: NPS Description

Naval Postgraduate School

100 Years of Relevance and Excellence: Education and Research Serving National Security

Mission

NPS provides high-quality, relevant and unique advanced education and research programs that increase the combat effectiveness of the Naval Services, other Armed Forces of the U.S. and our partners, to enhance our national security. [CFR 1.1]

Vision

As a naval/defense-oriented research university, the Naval Postgraduate School will operate as a geographically distributed educational system that provides a broad range of high-quality graduate education in support of national and international security. [CFR 1.1]

I. Preface: NPS Description

The Naval Postgraduate School (NPS), considered the research university of the Navy, is an institution dedicated to providing relevant education and research to the defense and security arenas, recognizing and innovatively solving problems in support of U.S. military forces, global partners and national security. While many civilian universities provide graduate education, few are dedicated to providing substantial national security-related graduate educational programs for military officers, as well as federal, state and local government civilian employees and contractors. The Naval Postgraduate School is such a place. [CFR 1.6]

At NPS, four graduate Schools oversee 14 academic departments supporting more than 42 master's and 18 doctoral degree programs. In addition to 1,600 resident students, including more than 200 international students, NPS serves approximately 700 distributed learning students worldwide. [CFR1.5] Approximately 200-300 students pursue post-baccalaureate certificates. Four Institutes, multiple secure research facilities and 26 Centers of Excellence add to the wealth of intellectual resources. NPS delivers non-resident courses to students through online, web-enabled, video-tele-education (VTE) systems and/or by visiting faculty. Continuous learning, refresher and transitional educational opportunities abound. NPS also offers short-term, executive education courses and a variety of short courses in Monterey, throughout the U.S., and abroad. [CFR 1.2]

Students in residence at NPS are typically officers in one of the armed forces of the United States or civilian employees of the Department of Defense. Additionally, a substantial international student population includes military officers and defense civilians. Civilian personnel from state and local government organizations are also educated through the distributed learning programs. [CFR 1.5]

The NPS faculty is comprised of approximately 600 scholars and professionals, 10 percent of whom are military officers and half of whom are either tenured or tenure-track faculty. [CFR 3.1] To strengthen expertise and program relevance, and to expedite research successes at NPS, a robust mix of tenured faculty, research faculty, lecturers and visiting professionals integrate teaching with research, demonstrating the immediate applicability of scholarly solutions to defense-related problems. [CFR 3.2, 3.3]

Approximately 400 staff, directly employed by NPS, provide supporPreface: NPS Descriptiont for both the academic and administrative functions of the School. This workforce is supplemented by contractors and other Department of Defense (DoD) employees. Staff provides a wealth of functions ranging from office, budget and purchasing to laboratory assistance to maintenance to counseling, registration and student services. [CFR 1.3]

The NPS Board of Advisors, an 18 member federal advisory committee, provides guidance and reports to the Secretary of the Navy, the Chief of Naval Operations, and the Commandant of the Marine Corps on matters pertaining to NPS and its graduate education and research programs. (1, 2)