The Disaster Resiliance Leadership Academy works to strengthen global humanitarian leadership. The goal of this is to allow for increased resilience in communities and among individuals impacted by natural or manmade disasters. They do this by addressing the causes of vulnerability such as poverty and social inequality. They are able to do this through education, research, and application.
It's targeted to individuals who want to become leaders in times of disaster. Because this program targets the role and development of leadership and resilience as a means of producing adequate and effective outcomes, this program targets students who have high integrity and leadership skills.
The "core competencies" as the academy calls them, or the 5 academic pillars that are necessary for DRLA are: human & social factors, economics of disaster, encironment and infrastructure, disaster oprations, and measurement and evaluation.
In this program, either a Master of Science or a certificate can be obtained. A Master's degree would require 36 credits that can be done in 2 years or in 3 semesters. 18 of these credits must come from core courses that highlight each of the academic pillars as well as 2 research-based courses. The other 18 come from electives, 6 of which must be DRLS. In order to obtain a certificate, 12 credit hours of coursework over 2 semesters is needed. These 12 should be composed of 4 core academic pillar courses.
The aim of this program is "to equip students with a skill-set in emergency preparedness, nonprofit leadership, disaster management, grass-root development, monitoring and evaluation and disaster risk and recovery". Through this aim and other goals, the requirements for the program create graduates with the professional responsibility, ethical behavior, and integrity expected of leaders in this field.
Because this is an academy, it does have tuition and fees. They are outlined as: Tuition, per credit hour: $981. Academic Support Fee, per semester: $420. Additional Fees (mandatory):$590 -- (Student Activity: $120, Health Center: $320, Reily Center: $150). Medical Insurance, per academic year: $3,030. Assuming people don't waive the medical insurance, take 16 credit hours (as is the norm for RPI), the yearly cost is: $20,156.
The Provost's Office provides students up to $500 for travel needed to present a poster or paper at a conference. There are other opportunities to be granted money with the purpose of travel for conferences or training opportunities.
Other than this information, I could not find who else would fund this academy. I can assume that Tulane takes on part of the burden as well as governmental agencies in their partner countries.
This program is located at Tulane University in New Orleans, but has partnership with Ethiopia, Ghana, Mali, Nigeria, Somalia, South Africa, Sri Lanka, Thailand, Uganda, and the US.
On the academy's front page, they have information regarding DRLA in the news and other highlights. It would appear that the program is highly regarded. USAID's Office of US Foreign Disaster Assistance visits Tulane to speak to students about career opportunities, showing that this program produces leaders that would fit the role of a caring and talented worker. Graduate students were also able to collaborate with local volunteer teams in the Louisiana Flood Recovery. Some Tulane professors also have UNICEF grants, which allow them to help lead UNICEF tranings meant to strengthen social service workfoce. They have met with several governmental agencies and FEMA, which provides a framework highlighting how well esteemed this academy and program really is.
This was created post-Katrina as a result of failures in disaster leadership. They saw that there as a lack of an organization that focused on leadership and resiliency in producing effective programs or outcomes, which makes DRLS so unique.
Yes - students can receive certifications or masters degrees.