BY COURTNEY DIBIASIO // MAY 15, 2012 // 

Jeremy Kittredge’s father, Dave, works in finance and even owns his own company in Pennsylvania. Financialfootprint.com is an online financial guide that helps young adults manage their money.

But Kittredge, a sophomore at Curry, has no intention of joining the family business. There simply isn’t enough action.

Instead, Kittredge, 19, wants to pursue a career in criminal justice. He says his cousins, who are both police officers, turned him on to the field. Kittredge would sometimes go on ride-alongs with them and came to realize that he wanted to work in the public sector.

Although finance is something of a family business, Jeremy Kittredge wants to pursue a career in law. // PHOTO COURTESY

“I don’t want every day to be the same,” says Kittredge. “I want a different day, every day.”

His interest in the law has only increased after taking classes at Curry such as policing and criminal law, Kittredge says. It was through these classes that he realized police work might not be for him.

“A dream job for me would be a career working in a prosecutor’s office as a paralegal,” says Kittredge, a member of the Criminal Justice Honors Society. “I would be able to use what I am learning here at Curry, but be able to angle it toward what I am more interested in: the legal aspect of the criminal justice system.”

Kittredge is more than your average CJ major. This semester, he was chosen by Professor Jennifer Balboni to participate in the Northeastern Association of Criminal Justice Sciences (NEACJS) conference. The annual event will take place June 6-9 at Roger Williams University in Bristol, R.I.; the conference theme is “Intellectuals or Entrepreneurs? Criminal Justice Education and Practice in the 21^st Century.”

Kittredge is working with Balboni to write a research paper on two Supreme Court cases—Miller vs. Alabama and Jackson vs. Arkansas—about whether juveniles should be sentenced to prison without the possibility of parole.

“It’s a big honor for Dr. Balboni to pick me out of everyone,” says Kittredge.

To prepare for his presentation, he has listened to the Court’s oral arguments and analyzed the questions the justices asked.

“He is clearly very bright, prepared and can do a sophisticated analysis,” said Balboni.

When he’s not plotting his future, Kittredge can often be found jogging on or around campus. He said his dad was a runner in college, so he can at least follow in his father’s footsteps in that regard.