On behalf of the faculty and staff of the Joint Advanced Warfighting School (JAWS), I want to congratulate you on being selected to represent your nation, your department, your agency in the upcoming academic year’s class of the Joint Advanced Warfighting School (JAWS). The time and effort you have invested into your reputation as a military professional is a testament to your ability to thrive in demanding situations. Well done and welcome.
Your presence is important to us and the academic environment we seek for all our students. Your unique perspectives will improve the experience every graduate takes away from their year at the school. Faculty, staff, and former students from the program will all attest that this coming year will be challenging, but they will also assure you that everyone here is single-mindedly focused on helping you be successful as a student, a professional, a spouse, a parent, and a friend.
Consistent with the mission of National Defense University (NDU), the purpose of JAWS is to ensure the United States, and its allies and partners, prevail in war, peace, and competition.
The school’s mission is to provide joint senior-level education and prepare U.S. and international military officers and U.S. Government civilians to serve in strategic leadership positions and lead the development of theater strategies, campaigns, and operations for the employment of joint forces in support of strategic objectives and policy goals.
Through delivery of an integrated curriculum focused on the operational employment of joint and coalition military forces in peace and war, the school produces historically informed, strategically minded, joint warfighters.
The JAWS curriculum comprises five fields of study, each contributing to their own important program learning outcome:
1) The Theory & History Field of Study enables students to synthesize historical, current, and future environments, domains, theories, and concepts as they apply to joint warfighting.
2) The Strategy Field of Study enables students to propose military strategies in support of joint warfighting that optimizes ends, ways, and means, in concert with the other instruments of power.
3) The Operational Art & Campaign Planning Field of Study enables students to produce military plans for the operational employment of joint and coalition forces in support of joint warfighting during peace and war.
4) The Effective Communication Field of Study enables students to compose clear and succinct communications based on critical analysis in written and oral form that is persuasive and appropriate to the audience and context.
5) The Joint Synthesis Field of Study enables students to represent the value of integrating diverse attitudes, perspectives, and capabilities based on an appreciation of the nature of the joint, interagency, intergovernmental, and multinational environment.
In addition to guest lectures, seminar discussions, the JAWS curriculum includes multiple field research trips, exercises, and key events:
1) The Theory & History Field of Study hosts a day field research trip to a World War II Aviation Museum in the local area and an overnight field research trip to the US battlefields of Yorktown and Fredericksburg in the fall.
2) The Strategy Field of Study hosts two 1-week strategy development exercises in the fall and an embassy crisis exercise in the spring.
3) The Operational Art & Campaign Planning Field of Study hosts planning exercises during each of their four classes in the spring.
4) The Effective Communication Field of Study hosts a week-long public speaking symposium in the spring.
5) The Joint Synthesis Field of Study hosts a week-long field research trip to Washington, D.C. in the fall; a week-long exercise with students from the Swedish Defence University (SeDU) in the spring; a nearly two-week field research trip to the Indo-Pacific Region in the spring; a two-week Capstone exercise in May and oral comprehensive final examinations just before graduation in June; and multiple engagements with senior leaders from the United States and our allies.
As graduates of JAWS earn both Joint Professional Military Education – Level II certification and a fully-accredited Master of Science degree in Joint Campaign Planning and Strategy, the Effective Communication Field of Study requires students to demonstrate the ability to conduct, compose, and present graduate-level research. During the initial weeks of the program, students will select one of several elective research seminars to personalize their academic experience and provide the structured environment to help them satisfy their 40-page Individual Strategic Research Paper (ISRP) requirement by mid-spring. Incoming students will benefit from having some idea of what research topics might interest them, but do not need to have a formal plan when they arrive.
Additional JAWS links are available above to provide useful reference and preparation information. If we can assist you in any way, do not hesitate to call the JFSC Registrar & Personnel Services office at DSN 646-6124; COMM (757) 443-6124 or via e-mail at registrar2@ndu.edu.
ERIC S. FOWLER
Colonel, US Army
10th Director of the Joint Advanced Warfighting School