The Rabinowitz Honors College (RHC) Research Assistants Program promotes faculty-student collaborations and allows students to gain valuable practical skills while providing much needed staffing for ongoing faculty projects. Current research teams are studying topics ranging from vaping fluids and solar structures to disability activism, binary fatty acid mixtures, and the history of the Affordable Care Act.
“This program provides our students with a window into advanced work in their fields of interest,” said RHC Dean Warren Frisina, who created the program. “They get a taste of what it’s like to add new knowledge to an important conversation. But most of all, by working closely with their teachers, they build a relationship with someone who can guide them now and on into the future as they pursue their dreams.”
Recent Research Assistants in Criminology and Sociology:
Kimberley Casey '22 assisted Adjunct Professor of Sociology Robert Costello on a literature review for research project, tentatively titled “From Nothing Works in the 1970s to Wilding in the 1980s to Super Predators in 1990s to Drill Music in the 2020s: A 50-Year Review of Popular Culture, Media and Criminal Justice Policy.” This article explores how criminal justice policy is not the result of scientifically tested theories or evidence-based decisions. Rather, policy is too often the result of popular opinions formed by the media, which tends to sensationalize phrases and ideas largely from popular culture and creates a myopic narrative of crime in America.
Clare Helfman '24 is assisting Professor of Sociology Margaret Abraham on a project titled “Persistence and Change: Collaborative, conceptual and contextual understandings of gender-based and intersectional violence in Australia and the United States.” The research includes a review of relevant literature and an introduction on how to write for a conference presentation/publication.
Lily Marston '23 is working with Adjunct Professor of Sociology Lior Gideon on an interdisciplinary book project that brings public health into the study of penology and corrections. The book covers the sociology of health, public health and corrections while examining various challenges faced by many of today’s correctional systems. Ranging in scope from theories of public health, legal aspects of correctional health, to focus on infectious diseases, and special populations, the book will provide a much-needed platform to an important interdisciplinary discussion that affects not just those who are incarcerated, but entire communities and the general society.