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Department of Criminal Justice and Criminology Megan Parks

Parks, Megan 2022 headshotPh.D. Candidate
Wilson-Short 107A, WSU Pullman
megan.parks@wsu.edu
 

 

 

Education

Ph.D., Criminal Justice and Criminology, (In Progress), Washington State University
M.A. Sociology, 2019, Colorado State University
B.A. Sociology and Criminal Justice, 2017, Eastern Washington University

Profile

Megan Parks is a doctoral candidate in the Department of Criminology and Criminal Justice at Washington State University. She received her MA from Colorado State University in Sociology with an emphasis in Crime/Law/Deviance in 2019. She has been the lab manager of the Complex Social Interactions lab for the last three years and her primary responsibilities in this position include: training/supervising undergraduate students, engaging in the collaborative development and managing of agency led projects, ensuring adherence to strict IRB protocols, and data management, cleaning, and analysis with a focus on producing valid data.

Additionally, Megan has been the Research for Public Safety Research Assistant with Pullman Police Department the last three years. In this position, she has worked closely with the police agency on research projects including a wide array of topics/efforts such as implementing data collection methods, using agency data to inform decisions, and grant writing. She has given numerous research presentations to stakeholders and the community regarding policing topics. She is currently working with the police agency as an evaluator of a COPS Office Law Enforcement Mental Health and Wellness grant that the agency is using to develop a regional peer support program. She has experience working in statistical analysis software programs such as R and STATA, and she is proficient with Microsoft Access and developing/coding data entry processes. She has spent the last three years working in depth with police agency data (and other public health/safety agencies), focusing on contextualizing and data cleaning processes.

Megan’s research focuses on policing, specifically the practical aspects of police work and officer perspectives/experiences to improve police-community relations via effective training/programming. She is an applied researcher, working closely with agencies on evaluation projects revolving around police programming and broader public safety topics. Her current work is primarily concentrated on officer health and wellness programming.

Courses Taught

Graduate Instructor: Realizing Justice in a Multi-Cultural Society, Crime Control Policies
Complex Social Interactions Lab Manager 2019-2022

Research Interests

Policing, police training/practices, body-worn cameras, rural policing, evaluation research, police health and wellness programming, police-community relationships, law enforcement and public health connections.