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Erin HudnallFaculty Mentor: Katie Corcoran
Erin is a Ph.D. candidate in sociology focused on rural community research. She received a BA in sociology and a BA in psychology from West Virginia Wesleyan College. Erin's interests include prosocial behavior, disaster volunteerism, community development, and the sociology of rural communities and organizations. She is an applied, community-engaged researcher with hopes to advance public sociology in West Virginia and within the discipline. Her current research focuses on the processes of community development and place-making in rural contexts. |
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Brittany KowalskiFaculty Mentor: Rachel Stein
Brittany received her BA in sociology with a double major in Catholic studies, a minor in women and gender studies, and a certificate from the honors program from Seton Hall University in 2015. She then began her graduate studies at West Virginia University where she graduated with her MA in sociology in May 2017. Her master’s thesis focused on gender roles and their effect on attraction amongst college students. She is currently a third-year doctoral student in the sociology program at WVU and pursuing a certificate in higher education teaching. Brittany is currently a Graduate Research Assistant on an NSF funded grant with Drs. Kasi Jackson and Sharon Bird that is examining the effectiveness of programs at addressing barriers to greater representation of historically underrepresented groups in academia. Her broad interests include gender, social psychology, roles, perceptions, motivations, religion, and methods. |
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Ellory DabbsFaculty Mentor: Chris Scheitle
Ellory is a fourth-year Ph.D. student in sociology. She graduated with a BA in criminology and a minor in sociology from the University of Pittsburgh at Johnstown in December of 2016 and received her MA in sociology in May of 2018. She is currently working towards the completion of her dissertation on juror's perceptions of forensic expert testimony. Ellory has worked with Dr. Chris Scheitle since 2017 studying graduate students' perceptions of their academic experiences. Particularly, how have students religiosity (or lace thereof) affect their experiences as a graduate student. |
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Stephanie House-NiamkeFaculty Mentor: Chris Scheitle
House-Niamke is a doctoral student in sociology at West Virginia University and is a W.E.B. Du Bois Fellow. She received her Bachelor of Business Administration in Marketing in 2012 from Radford University and her Master of Public Administration from Virginia Tech in May 2017. Additionally, she has two graduate certificates in Women's and Gender Studies as well as Higher Education Administration. She has facilitated conversations across difference focusing on race, gender and religion for the past five years. She has worked with pre-service teachers to develop inclusive classroom practices and curriculum and has guest-lectured on Critical Race Theory (CRT) at Virginia Tech and American University. Since arriving in Morgantown, she has worked with Dr. Katie Corcoran as a summer graduate research assistant and has been invited to speak at workshops addressing systemic racism in business and technology fields. House-Niamke’s research interests concern power, access, and choice across the areas of race, gender, and religion. This includes social policy on a university campus, anti-racist pedagogy and identity development for melanin-dominant communities and women who participate in religious institutions. Additionally, she has published work on teachers of color's resistance to Critical Race Theory in curriculum. She has also published on CRT in public policy and environmental policy decisions and has presented at several conferences about womanism, womanist theology, and educational support for melanin-dominant communities. |