Online Master's Degree in Information Technology

This course introduces the overall foundations required for the understanding of, and further study in, information systems security. It reviews the history of security and computer systems security in particular to develop a set of models to guide the approach to realizing computer systems security. An overview of current security technologies is presented. A research project and formal paper are required.

As enterprise systems become even more complex with the introduction of new technologies rapidly increasing, having a well thought out architecture tying to the four domains of enterprise architecture is even more crucial to the survival of an enterprise. The four domains encompass the business operating model, information architecture, application software, and the overall technology infrastructure. The Enterprise Systems Architecture course explores current approaches to an enterprise level design of systems architectures within these four domains. Emphasis is placed on high-level design issues and opportunities for long-term systems planning.

This course introduces the fundamental Enterprise Data Management concepts of enterprise content management (ECM) and data governance. ECM techniques for building, managing, and maintaining an organization’s information infrastructure is studied. Data governance topics include development of policies and procedures to ensure the availability, usability, integrity, and security of data resources and the implementation and management of those policies.

Networks are vitally important to today's organizations. Networking technologies continuously change and network professionals must integrate those changes without disrupting existing network traffic. Students will examine current networking architectures and explore networking applications, and protocols to assess their impact on a business organization. The course covers the basic concepts of data communications and design. This includes discussions on network operating systems as well as transmission media, communications hardware, network topologies, switching methods and network analysis. Students will research emerging technologies such as wireless networking, multi-media networking, virtual private networks, cloud computing and IPSec security.

This course is focused on advanced management strategies that can maximize opportunities in a changing dynamic environment. Strategic management is linked to successful global projects and is a key part of a sustainable competitive market profile. Course material includes strategies to understand growth and how to implement strategic plans to achieve and sustain a competitive profile in the emerging global marketplace. The balanced scorecard is presented as an approach to understanding an organization’s strategic objectives and performance measures.

This course is an introduction to the foundational discipline of effective project management in any industry. It examines the methods, approaches, processes, skills, tools and techniques, and value delivery system that project managers use to complete their projects on schedule, within budget, within scope, within quality, and customer acceptance. Students will explore and apply elements of the theoretical and operational framework of project management.

The Information Technology Capstone demonstrates mastery and vital knowledge from the prior course of study completed by the student. The content, concepts, and knowledge from the applicable programs are critically applied by completing an in-depth project utilizing project management techniques and focusing on a major technical problem or major issue that impacts the student’s own organization or in a desired area of study. The course requires the student to perform a comprehensive analysis and study in a selected area of interest. The student will prepare a formal technical report of the detailed research and application of prior course

This course covers the theory and techniques that one employs to determine the cause of and sequence of events leading up to a security breach in computer systems. This includes the identification of clues and their locations on the offended system, in the associated local network, and into the Internet itself. Techniques to prevent or mitigate such breaches are explored.

This course covers aspects of security that apply to creation, deployment, and maintenance of applications and data bases, including the practical and regulatory concerns of information assurance. Included also are the security concerns in this domain as pertains to cloud computing and virtualization. The system vulnerabilities of poor programming practice are examined and suggestions for mitigation developed.

Operating Systems Security provides an in-depth analysis of the security components at the operating system level. The focus is on the development of a security policy and the basic elements that provide identification and authentication, access control and security auditing. In addition to general concepts, both the UNIX/Linux and Windows operating systems are studied. Students participate in hands-on lab assignments to reinforce the material as well as to gain familiarity with a number of available operating system security products and tools (both freeware and commercially available).

Students are provided with a brief overview of the basic elements of networking concepts, topologies, protocols and threats necessary to understand network security issues and make security relevant decisions. An in-depth analysis of the Open Systems Interconnection (OSI) model and layered network security mechanisms needed to provide Confidentiality, Integrity, Availability, Authorization, Authentication and Non-repudiation within a network environment is included. This course includes a thorough treatment of cryptography and cryptographic services. An implementation plan and formal paper are required.

This course covers a variety of issues relating to the management of information systems security. The topics covered include development of policies, standards and procedures, risk analysis methodologies, contingency planning and disaster recovery. Additional topics covered include legal and ethical issues, incident reporting, security auditing, computer crime, and security awareness and training. Implementation issues, potential conflicts and tradeoffs are also discussed. A project is required.

This course explores current database systems and provides a foundation for future study. Techniques for the design and implementation of relational databases are presented and applied using SQL and a DBMS. Other data models such as the object-oriented and object-relational models are examined and compared to the relational model. Database systems using data warehouses and data marts, distributed databases, and web-based databases are discussed.

This course provides an in-depth study of data warehouses and data marts. Specific techniques for conceptual, logical, and physical design of data warehouses are presented. Other topics include extraction-transformation-load (ETL) techniques, online analytical processing (OLAP), data warehouse applications, and the relationship between data warehouses and traditional database. Completion of a significant project is required.

This course explores business intelligence systems and methods to enhance an enterprise’s business value and capabilities. Data processed properly, leads to information. Information clustered, segmented, mined and analyzed leads to business intelligence, which is critical to business success. Students are given the opportunity to determine how they can exploit business intelligence to improve the competitive advantage of an enterprise, incorporate performance management, evaluate future market trends, and enhance customer service.

This course presents the principles and practices of network administration. Students will evaluate and recommend specific IT infrastructure processes and current best practices in areas such as network configuration, user management, backup management, high-reliability configuration, and system security. Network issues such as UNIX interoperability, addressing, and routing are examined.

This course develops the skills needed to design and plan the implementation and maintenance of a diverse network environment that meets the needs of an organization’s enterprise architecture. Students will evaluate various framework models currently used by businesses and government agencies and apply those models to the development of a network architecture that considers an organization’s needs related to their business processes and their technical requirements for data, information, communication, software applications and security.

Effective strategy and policy development are the keys to unlocking the value of technology for a business. Students will learn to evaluate various strategies and apply them to the business needs of an organization through the development and effective communication of IT policies. The principles of IT governance, goal alignment, risk management, policy development, process establishment and continuous improvement are applied to construct an effective information technology service that improves performance and competitiveness within the organization.

The Virtual Systems course examines current technologies that provide virtualization in the areas of network management, server management, data management and cloud computing. Students will analyze the current network infrastructure, set goals, define implementation plans and calculate Return on Investment (ROI) for server and desktop consolidation, data replication, backup and archiving, voice over IP (VOIP) and cloud computing. Students will also analyze the efficient use of virtualization technologies to provide a greener footprint for power usage, space requirements and manpower.