Sanford has a wide variety of national security experts teaching in the MNSP program. Meet some of the faculty experts:
Admiral Dennis Blair
MNSP Course: Threats and Opportunities
Admiral Dennis Blair is the first Knott Distinguished Visiting Professor of the Practice at the University of North Carolina Chapel Hill. He serves as a member of the Energy Security Leadership Council and chairs the board of Securing America’s Future Energy. In addition, he serves on the boards of Freedom House, the National Bureau of Asian Research, the National Committee on U.S.-China Relations, No Labels, and chairs the Strategic Advisory Group of Lockheed Martin Space.
From 2014-18 Admiral Blair was the CEO and Chairman of the Board of the Sasakawa Peace Foundation USA. From January 2009 to May 2010, as Director of National Intelligence, Admiral Blair led the sixteen national intelligence agencies. He was president and chief executive officer of the Institute for Defense Analyses from 2003-06.
Prior to retiring from the Navy in 2002 after a career of 34 years, Admiral Blair was the Commander in Chief, U.S. Pacific Command. A graduate of the U.S. Naval Academy, Admiral Blair earned a master’s degree in history and languages from Oxford University as a Rhodes scholar. He is the author of Military Engagement: Influencing Armed Forces Worldwide to Support Democratic Transitions. Three commissions he co-chaired have issued recent reports: A National Security Strategy for 5G; Oil Security 2025: U.S. National Security Policy in an Era of Domestic Oil Abundance, and The Report of the Commission on the Theft of American Intellectual Property
Dr. Doug Brook
MNSP Course: National Security Budgeting
Douglas A. Brook is Visiting Professor in the Sanford School of Public Policy at Duke University. He is also Emeritus Professor at the Naval Postgraduate School. At NPS, he was dean of the Graduate School of Business & Public Policy, professor of public policy, and director of the Center for Defense Management Research.
Brook has served in four presidentially appointed positions. He served a 14-month tour in the Pentagon, first as Assistant Secretary of the Navy (Financial Management & Comptroller) and later as Acting Under Secretary of Defense (Comptroller)/Chief Financial Officer. From 1990 to 1992, he served as Assistant Secretary of the Army (Financial Management). He was Acting Director of the U. S. Office of Personnel Management in 1992.
Brook holds a BA degree in political science and a Master of Public Administration degree from the University of Michigan. He earned his PhD in public policy at George Mason University in 2001.
DR. FRANCES TILNEY BURKE
MNSP Course: National Security Institutions
Burke is an Adjunct Professor in the Sanford School of Public Policy at Duke University. She is the George P. Shultz Visiting Postdoctoral Fellow at the Ronald Reagan Presidential Foundation and Institute in Washington, DC and a Senior Adviser and Leadership and Development at Exactus Advisors.
Burke previously served as a special assistant to two Deputy Secretaries of Defense, a counterterrorism analyst at the Defense Intelligence Agency and a foreign affairs adviser in the Office of the Under Secretary of Defense for Policy (Western Hemisphere Affairs and Detainee Policy). She was also an intelligence officer in the U.S. Navy Reserve.
Burke has served as a World Politics & Statecraft Fellow at the Smith Richardson Foundation and a Visiting Research Fellow at the American Enterprise Institute. She is a Board Member and Advisor for Orion Military Scholarships and a long-time volunteer for Army families and recipient of the Department of the Army Commanders’ Awards for Public Service from the 7th Infantry Division, the 25th Infantry Division, and the 101st Airborne Division.
Burke holds an A.B. degree in History and Literature from Harvard University and an MPhil in Latin American Studies from Oxford University. She earned her MA in Law and Diplomacy and her Ph.D. in international relations from The Fletcher School, Tufts University, in 2021.
Dr. Greta E. Creech
MNSP Course: Leadership in the National Security Environment
Greta E. Creech is an Adjunct Professor in the Sanford School of Public Policy at Duke University. She is also an Adjunct Professor in the Intelligence and Security Studies Department at The Citadel. She is the founder of Tundra Star, LLC.
Creech previously served as a GEOINT Analyst, Executive Officer, and Chief of Staff at the National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency. She received the National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency Program Office Administration Leadership Award. She was also Russia Team Lead at the National Aeronautics and Space Administration.
Creech belongs to the International Leadership Association and Women in Intelligence. She is a peer reviewer for The Journal of Business Ethics.
Creech holds a B.S. degree in political science from the College of Charleston. She also holds an M.A. in political science from George Washington University and an M.S. in Strategic Intelligence from National Intelligence University. She earned her Ph.D. from Antioch University in 2021.
Dr. Emily Goldman
MNSP Course: National Security Strategy
Emily Goldman is an Adjunct Professor in the Sanford School of Public Policy at Duke University. She is a Cyber Strategist at the U.S. Cyber Command and National Security Agency. She previously served as an Associate Professor in the Department of Political Science at the University of California, Davis. She was also a Visiting Professor in the Department of National Security Affairs at the U.S. Naval War College.
Goldman previously served as the Cyber Advisor to the Director of Policy Planning at the U.S. Department of State. From 2013 to 2018, she was Director of the Combined Action Group at U.S. Cyber Command and National Security Agency. She also served as Deputy Director for Interagency Coordination in the Office of Communication of the U.S. Central Command, and as a Senior Advisor to the Coordinator for Counterterrorism at the U.S. Department of State.
She was a Residential Fellow at the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars, a John M. Olin Fellow at Harvard University, and a MacArthur Fellow in the Center for International Security and Arms Control at Stanford University. Goldman holds a B.A. degree in political science from the University of Pennsylvania. She earned her Ph.D. in political science from Stanford University.
PHILIP J. CANDREVA
MNSP Course: National Security Budgeting
Philip J. Candreva is an Adjunct Professor in the Sanford School of Public Policy at Duke University. He is also a Senior Lecturer of Budgeting & Public Policy at the Department of Defense Management in the Naval Postgraduate School and an Adjunct Professor of Law at the Monterey College of Law.
Candreva retired from active duty in 2006, after a 22-year career including operational assignments and financial management responsibilities at which time he entered academia. Since 2015, in addition to other academic duties, he has taught in the Navy’s Center for Executive Education and has consulted for over three dozen flag officers on financial matters.
Candreva authored the book, National Defense Budgeting and Financial Management, and numerous peer-reviewed articles in the areas of performance-based budgeting, appropriations law, and managing fiscal stress. He serves on the Board of Trustees of the Monterey College of Law.
Candreva holds a B.S. degree in mineral economics from Pennsylvania State University. He earned an M.S. degree in Financial Management from the Naval Postgraduate School in 1996 and a J.D. from the Monterey College of Law in 2015.
Dr. Elizabeth Grasmeder
MNSP Course: Methods of Policy Analysis
Elizabeth Grasmeder is an Adjunct Professor in the Sanford School of Public Policy at Duke University. She served since 2015 as an instructor teaching US Government officials and foreign service officers courses on Africa and the Middle East, among other topics.
Grasmeder has served as a foreign policy analyst in the US Government since 2008, and is a member of its senior analytic cadre. Among her teaching duties, Grasmeder was the Lead Instructor for the Military Analysis Seminar for the US Government from 2019 to 2020, and since 2015 has lead or co-led courses on the modern Middle East, sub-Saharan Africa, and insurgency and counterinsurgency. In 2019 and 2020, Grasmeder received the Pat Roberts Intelligence Scholars Program award, and previously was awarded graduate studies fellowships by the US Government in 2008 and 2009.
Alongside foreign policy work, Grasmeder also has served as a leader in US Government diversity, equity, and inclusion initiatives, and including leading and supporting employee advocacy groups for female officers, LGBTQ+ officers, and employees and their dependents with disabilities
Grasmeder holds a B.S. degree in Foreign Service and an M.A. in Arab Studies from Georgetown University. She earned her Ph.D. in political science from The George Washington University in 2020. Her research has been published in International Security, The Washington Post, and War on the Rocks.
Mark Mazzetti
MNSP Course: National Security Ethics
Mark Mazzetti is an Adjunct Professor in the Sanford School of Public Policy at Duke University. He is also a Washington Correspondent for The New York Times, and has covered national security issues from the Washington Bureau since 2006. Mazzetti previously served as a Pentagon Correspondent for the Los Angeles Times and U.S. News & World Report.
Mazzetti received the 2017 Pulitzer Prize for National Reporting and the 2009 Pulitzer Prize for International Reporting. He received the George Polk Award for Military Reporting in 2010 and 2015.
Mazzetti holds a B.A. degree in Public Policy Studies and History from Duke University. He received a Master of Studies degree from Oxford University in 1997.
Laura Hall
MNSP Course: Team-Based Learning
Laura A. Hall is an Adjunct Professor in the Sanford School of Public Policy at Duke University. She is a senior inspector at the Office of the Inspector General, U.S. Department of State, where she oversees reviews of U.S. foreign assistance programs. Previously, she was the Senior Advisor to the Assistant Administrator for National Preparedness at the Federal Emergency Management Agency. Hall previously served at the U.S. Department of State for more than twenty years, most recently as the Director for the Near East and North Africa in the Office of U.S. Foreign Assistance Resources from 2011-2019.
Hall served in the National Security Council as the Director for Stability Operations and the Director for International Development. She was also integral to the creation of the Office of the Coordinator for Reconstruction and Stabilization at the U.S. Department of State, where she served in multiple roles. She has also led several major reform efforts at the Department, focused on agile overseas response to conflict and the policy decision process. Early in her career, Hall worked on nuclear arms control negotiations, served at the U.S. Embassy Moscow, and advised the Chief Human Capital Officer.
Hall was a Council on Foreign Relations International Affairs Fellow in 2010. Hall holds a Baccalaureus Artium et Scientae degree from the Honors College at the University of South Carolina. She received an MPA degree in international security and economics from the University of Maryland School of Public Policy in 1998.
Tim Nichols
MNSP Course: Team-Based Learning for National Security Professionals
Tim Nichols (B.A, UVA; M.A, USF; M.B.A.,NCSU) Tim served as an intelligence officer in the Marine Corps for over 21 years with extensive experience in the special operations, intelligence, and counterterrorism fields. His overseas experience spanned deployments to Saudi Arabia, Iraq, Afghanistan, the Middle East, East Africa, Central America, and the Pacific. He was designated a Regional Affairs Officer for East Africa. While in Iraq, he directed a joint interagency task force attempting to track and target foreign extremists traveling to Iraq for violent activities.
Prior to his retirement from the military, Tim taught courses in Leadership, Ethics, and Management at Duke, UNC, and NC State for four years. In addition to his consulting activities, Tim is currently a research fellow and visiting professor of the practice in the School of Public Policy at Duke University. He is the executive director of the Counterterrorism and Public Policy Fellowship Program and the Faculty Representative for the Master of National Security Policy Program.
His research interests and teaching responsibilities include policy analysis, intelligence, interagency coordination, national security, homeland security and counterterrorism policy.
Dr. Jon Rosenwasser
MNSP Course: Spring National Security Elective
Jon J. Rosenwasser is an Adjunct Professor in the Sanford School of Public Policy at Duke University. He is also the Budget & Policy Director for the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence.
Rosenwasser previously served as Program Manager for the Center for the Study of Intelligence at the Central Intelligence Agency and as a Senior Strategist at the Office of the Director of National Intelligence. He was an Adjunct Professor in the School of Public Policy at George Mason University from 2005 to 2007.
Rosenwasser is a member of the National Trust for Historic Preservation, the Armed Forces Communication and Electronics Association, and the National Stuttering Association.
Rosenwasser holds a B.A. from Stanford University and an MPP from the Sanford School of Public Policy at Duke University. He earned his Ph.D. from The Fletcher School of Law & Diplomacy at Tufts University in 2004.
The faculty at Duke University’s Sanford School of Public Policy have earned national and international recognition for excellence in research, policy engagement and teaching.
Sanford has a diverse mix of academic scholars and professors of the practice whose practical experience in top leadership roles enhances the classroom experience.