Community Engaged Scholarship
Discover projects and activities the professors and students in the public sociology and public criminology programs are currently engaged in.
Dr. Kimberly Cook, Professor of Sociology & Criminology
Dr. Cook is engaged with public sociology/criminology in the following ways: She is an active member of the NAACP and works on the criminal justice committee in the local chapter. She serves Chairs the Board of Directors for a local non-profit devoted to prisoner reentry: LINC (Leading Into New Communities), and on the Board of Directors for the Healing Justice Project which identifies and liaises with original crime victims and exonerees in wrongful conviction cases to promote improve aftermath services across the country.
In addition, Dr. Cook is involved in promoting restorative justice practices in the greater Wilmington area.
Dr. Kristen DeVall, Professor of Sociology and Dr. Christina Lanier, Professor of Criminology
Drs. Kristen DeVall and Christina Lanier are actively engaged in public sociology and public criminology. Their work focuses on assisting agencies and programs in the areas of grant-writing and program evaluation. Recently, they have begun work on evaluating the New Hanover Drug Treatment Court (along with Dr. Darrell Irwin) to assess the effectiveness of this problem-solving court in reducing recidivism and improving participants' quality of life.
Similarly, they recently completed (along with Dr. Mike Maume) a state-wide evaluation of the NC Treatment Accountability for Safer Communities (TASC) program for Coastal Horizons Center, Inc. This project investigated the impact of the program on criminal recidivism among TASC graduates and those who were unsuccessfully discharged. Drs. DeVall and Lanier have also worked closely with the Wilmington Housing Authority to assess the needs of public housing residents and the needs of the local community to assist in the development of a comprehensive strategy and plan for their Choice Neighborhoods grant proposal.
Drs. DeVall and Lanier received a 2014 Summer Curriculum Development award from the former College of Arts and Sciences to develop a Public Criminology undergraduate course and a 2014 Center for Teaching Excellence Summer Pedagogy award to create a set of Public Criminology course modules. The course will provide students a unique opportunity to engage in their community while the public criminology modules will allow faculty to bring public criminology into any course within the department's curriculum.
Both the course and the modules will greatly enhance students' research methods, theoretical, data analysis and writing skills as well as provide them with the opportunity to disseminate research beyond the academy.
Dr. Jill Waity, Professor and Chair of Sociology & Criminology
Dr. Waity is working with Dr. Balogh from the School of Nursing on a Community Engaged project related to food insecurity screening in rural areas as part of the Community Engaged Scholars Academy through the College of Health and Human Services.
*indicates student co-author