Emergency management professionals prepare the public to weather all kinds of incidents. Some are natural disasters, like fires or storms. Some are human-made, like industrial accidents, exposure to hazardous materials or terrorist acts. Others are institutional disruptions, like the Long Island Rail Road (LIRR) strike that interrupted the commutes of hundreds of thousands of people for three days in May 2026.
In Adelphi’s Department of Emergency Management, faculty members are making preparations of their own—in this case, for the future of the profession. Under their tutelage, students in the BS in Emergency Services Administration, MS in Emergency Management and Graduate Certificate in Emergency Management programs are learning how to take charge before, during and after crises that threaten their communities.
The Overlooked Consequences of a Transit Strike
A New York Times report on the LIRR strike profiled commuters who had to choose between waiting on long bus lines, taking sick days or working from home that week. The strike was inconvenient for office workers, but potentially disastrous for many of New York’s most essential services, such as hospitals, schools and public agencies.
“Telling people to work from home is sound guidance for a large part of the workforce,” said Nicholas Cagliuso, PhD, adjunct professor of emergency management. “But it doesn’t help the nurse, the home health aide, the retail clerk or the shift worker whose job requires being on site. The LIRR strike is a good reminder that ‘all-hazards’ really means ‘all-consequences.’”
Emergency Management Training Transcends Disciplines
Students studying emergency management at Adelphi are trained to follow an all-hazards approach, which translates, in the simplest terms, to “be ready for anything.” The program’s curriculum brings together the strengths of several schools at the University—including the College of Nursing and Public Health, College of Arts and Sciences and Robert B. Willumstad School of Business—to provide students with an interdisciplinary framework that can be applied to any emergency in any industry.
Terry Cooper, DHSc, clinical assistant professor and director of emergency management, calls emergency management “an art and a science.” “To be able to serve people to the best of our ability, we need to wear so many hats,” he said. “Our students are developing skills in everything from project management to human resources, communications, technical writing and science.”
Dr. Cagliuso echoes the sentiment. The backgrounds that serve students well in this profession, he says, are legion: public health, transportation, urban planning, public administration, business, labor relations and more. “Whatever your co-discipline or your interest is, wherever you’re coming from, there’s a space for you in this program,” Dr. Cooper added.
Preparing for the Big Picture Makes the Biggest Impact
No matter their background, emergency managers must be able to see the big picture. Professionals working on the LIRR strike would have been able to envision, for example, how displaced rail commuters would crowd roads and subway stations. And, most importantly, they’d have seen the strike coming. “This strike had a visible runway: years of negotiations, federal emergency boards, a near-miss in 2025 and a concrete timeline for mediation under federal labor law,” Dr. Cagliuso said. “A good emergency manager tracks a deadline the way they’d track a hurricane’s path.”
Unlike a hurricane, however, the LIRR strike left behind minimal damage in the end. All things considered, Dr. Cooper believes, this was “a plan that went right.” Commuters were notified in advance, the incident was resolved within three days and, in the meantime, nothing fell apart.
Teaching Students to Think on Their Feet
Though a deal was reached late on Monday night, full service was not restored for nearly 24 hours. Dr. Cagliuso sees a critical lesson there: “Live by the rule of no surprises.” As he notes, the LIRR couldn’t just “flip a switch” to get trains running in time for Tuesday morning’s commute. “My advice to newer professionals is to challenge your assumptions, not just your procedures. Exercise the oddball but plausible scenarios.”
Dr. Cooper plans his own curriculum around the inevitable oddball scenario, too. Though his classes are held online and asynchronously, he makes room for real-time discussions with students, often centering around current events—like a recent cyberattack targeting supermarket refrigerators in France—that are continuously evolving.
“These future professionals are going to have to make decisions on the fly that require critical thinking. Sometimes there isn’t a right answer, there’s just a best option,” he said. “Learning this early will make students much more competitive in their fields.”