Recent Faculty and Graduate Student Accomplishments
- Recent PhD graduate, Ming-Li Hsieh’s dissertation, titled ‘Rational Discretionary Risk: The Judicial Risk x Sentence Model for Sex Offenders,’ has been selected for the ACJS Braswell/Routledge Outstanding Dissertation Award
- Dr. Mary K. Stohr has been invited to serve on the National Institute of Justice’s Advisory Panel on “Workforce Issues in Corrections,” scheduled for Tuesday, March 7, 2017, 8:30 AM – 5:00 PM in Washington, D.C.
Research and Project updates:
NIJ Funded Research:
Several Criminal Justice/Criminology and Division of Governmental Studies and Services faculty (Drs. Dale Willits, David Makin, Craig Hemmens, Darryl Wood, Nicholas P. Lovrich, Mary K. Stohr, and John Snyder, J.D.) and doctoral students (Duane Stanton, Ruibin Liu, and Guangzhen Wu) began their work this January on the almost-$1 million, National Institute of Justice grant-funded research on “Effects of Marijuana Legalization on Law Enforcement and Crime.” Their research will employ the use of crime data, camera data, focus groups., and extensive interviews to determine how officer and police organizations have adjusted to accommodate legalization. We hope to include some undergraduate students in this three-year research cycle in fall 2017.
Washington Traffic Safety Commission Funded Research:
Three Criminal Justice/Criminology faculty (Drs. Dale Willits, Craig Hemmens, and Mary K. Stohr) and doctoral student Youngki Woo, along with Dr. Staci Hoff at the WTSC, are involved in research using fatality data to determine the effect of THC on drivers in motor vehicle accidents. The research will be completed in September 2017.
Solitary Confinement/Disciplinary Segregation:
Several Criminal Justice/Criminology doctoral students (Michael Campagna, Youngki Woo, Melissa Kowalski, Xiaohan Mei, and Elizabeth Thompson Tollefsbol) and faculty (Drs. Laurie Drapela, Zachary Hamilton, and Mary K. Stohr) are involved in the study of how solitary confinement affects mental health, violent infractions, and recidivism. The first two papers from this research are on mental health (Michael Campagna as lead author) and infractions and recidivism (Youngki Woo as lead author) and will be sent out for publication soon. We hope to work on two more papers off of this data set in the next year.