John Jay College Alumni Association Counter Terrorism Graduate Scholarship Award

Sponsored by the Billy Blanks Foundation

This scholarship honors Charles Mills, Class of '76, a supervisor for the New York State Department of Taxation and Finance who was at his desk on the 87th floor of #2 World Trade Center when the planes crashed into the building. During his prior law enforcement career Mills served as Chief of Police of Schenectady, New York, and with the New York City Transit Police.

The scholarship will pay $1000 for each of two semesters to a graduate student enrolled in the M.A. Certificate Program in Terrorism Studies. A student receiving this scholarship is expected to do an internship at the Center on Terrorism as defined by the Director of the Center.

2006/2007 Academic Year Requirements

To be eligible for the scholarship, students must have a minimum of a 3.5 GPA; be enrolled in the M.A. Certificate in Terrorism Studies Program; have accumulated between 12 and 18 graduate credits by the end of the Fall 2006 semester; and submit a written essay of 300 to 500 words concerning the way graduate education can contribute to the understanding and the prevention of terrorism. The essay for this year’s competition is due by December 1, 2006.

Past Recipients

2006-2007

Benjamin Orr is the recipient of the John Jay College Alumni Association Counter Terrorism Graduate Scholarship Award for the 2006-2007 academic year.  He is currently working toward his Masters in Public Administration at the School of Public Affairs at Baruch College , specializing in Policy Analysis.  Benjamin is also working toward the Certificate in Terrorism Studies offered by the Center on Terrorism at John Jay College of Criminal Justice.  He holds a B.A. in History from the University of Missouri-Rolla.  After graduation he hopes to enter law school.

Mr. Orr’s interest in terrorism and fundamentalist extremism both precedes and is a response to the attacks of September 11^th, 2001 .  He was raised in a Christian sect that, though pacifist, bore many markers of more violent groups.  After separating from the sect in college-the rest of his immediate family soon followed-he wrote his senior thesis in 2000 on the comparability of terrorist groups in first and third world countries, focusing on the Red Army Faction in Germany and Sendero Luminosa in Peru .  Currently his research interests are terrorist networks, terrorist financing and the intersection of civil liberties and counter terrorism policy.  Benjamin serves as a Research Associate at the Center on Terrorism on the Global Network Terrorism project.

2002-2003

Robert Marmara of Rockaway, New Jersey, is the recipient of the John Jay College Alumni Association Counter Terrorism Graduate Scholarship Award for the 2002-2003 academic year. Robert is the first recipient of the award given to a graduate student in honor of the many alumni who died in the September 11th attacks. Mr. Marmara served as the coordinator of a major national conference hosted by the Center on “Torture After 9/11” in the fall of 2003.

For more information contact Andrea Matten, Program Coordinator of the Center on Terrorism 212-237-8433