This spring, students at Ferris State University will have the option to take a new elective: Cold Case Investigations.
The class will focus on the responsibilities of crime scene analysts, teaching those who take it about “examining evidence, following leads and using modern forensic tools,” according to an official announcement released by the university last week.
Professor of Criminal Justice Steven Amey expressed that the lack of time is what has historically caused cold cases to be left out of the curriculum.
“Most of these cold cases lack the necessary ‘time’ it takes to help close these cases or investigate them. With over 100,000 cold cases in the United States there is no shortage of work to do,” Amey said.
The process of putting the class together, said Amey, felt like the stars were aligning.
After his old department in the St. Clair County Sheriff’s Office solved a 40-year-old cold case around the same time, a student asked about a cold case in Reed City. Amey happened to buy a true crime novel at a thrift store that had a handwritten note on the inside cover dedicated to someone sharing his first name.
This chain of events pushed him to reach out to a former student who’d gone on to work at the Michigan State Police crime lab, when he discovered that another former student had recently started at their cold case department and that people there had already been talking about the possibility of Amey developing a cold case class at Ferris.
After meeting with people behind similar programs in the area, he started the process of bringing the class to life.
“I have expanded my ideas to help with cold case investigations, not only from the ground level but with a twist of modernity to hopefully further or even solve an unknown question for many loved ones that want an answer to their missing or homicide,” Amey said.
Ferris State University’s criminal justice program already offers several bachelor’s programs, as well as a master’s, an associate and a minor. Other courses in the program include classes in creating safe schools, police report writing and firearms.
The cold case class will be open to junior or senior students studying in any field.
In order to be accepted into the class, they must first undergo a criminal background and fingerprint check, attend an in-person interview, write an essay about why they want to join the class and sign a non-disclosure agreement that covers anything involved with it.
Additionally, the course will only be offered on campus and students’ employment must not conflict with class time.
The class will join a growing number of similar courses at universities around the country, with Western Michigan University’s equivalent class that began in 2020 having already helped solve six previously unsolved cases.
Amey suggests that taking Ferris’ cold case class could improve students’ attention to detail, writing ability andunderstanding of how the legal system works, as well as teaching them more practically about what working on an unsolved case is often like and all the questions it can raise.
“There is no shortage of cold cases. Cold case classes have been successful in other universities, and I am confident Ferris will be no different. We have a biology forensics program, a nationally recognized criminal justice program andwe have a fantastic computer forensics program that has some of the newest technology out there. We are good at playing in the sandbox together, we all want the same goal, to educate a new mind with the ability and the skillset to help solve a cold case crime,” Amey said.
Students interested in learning more about the class and what it entails can visit the Ferris State University School of Criminal Justice’s website or contact Dr. Steven Amey at st********@****is.edu.