Sociology Faculty

Ryan Ceresola earned his Ph.D. at Southern Illinois University Carbondale, with a dissertation on the effects of US political corruption on voter turnout and citizen trust. His other research interests include criminology and criminal justice, civic engagement,environmental policies, and rural communities. His work has appeared in Sociological Perspectives, Rural Sociology, and Voluntas: International Journal of Voluntary and Nonprofit Organizations. He has an MA in Sociology from Southern Illinois University Carbondale and a BA in Sociology and in English from Pacific Lutheran University in Tacoma, WA. He teaches courses in the field of criminology and criminal justice as wellas quantitative methods.

Elena Chernyak earned her Ph.D. at the University of Windsor, Ontario, Canada. She holds her MA degree in Journalism from Saint-Petersburg State University (St-Petersburg, Russia), Master of Religious Education from Assumption University (Canada), and Master of Social Work from the University of Windsor (Canada). In her doctoral dissertation, Elena examined risk factors for intimate partner violence in post-Soviet societies. Elena’s research interests encompass gender (i.e. gender ideology, politics, gender discourses and social institutes), gender-based violence, international marriage and relationships, and cultural and religious influence on behavior and identity. Her individual and collaborative studies have been published in peer-reviewed journals and disseminated through a number of scholar conferences. Elena has over 10-years of teaching and research experience. She is a licensed Master Social Work and registered…

Reid Golden received his Ph.D. in Medical Sociology from the University at Albany.  His early research focused on social and racial inequalities and their impact on social problems such as violent crime and racial disparities in health. He has written on a number of IT related issues both pedagogical and otherwise. He has been a team evaluator for the Middle States Commission on Higher Education for many years. He currently is researching the impact of post-colonialism on the recent Ebola epidemic in west Africa. 

Barbara Smith will receive her Ph.D. at Texas State University – San Marcos, with a dissertation on the influence of drugs and alcohol on the rationality of situational offender decision-making. Her other research interests include offender decision-making, mixed-method research, program evaluation, crime analysis, race/ethnicity and crime, and correctional interventions for offenders with substance abuse problems. Her work has appeared in Journal Cogent Social Sciences and Encyclopedia of white-collar and corporate crime. She has an MS in Criminal Justice from Texas State University and a BA in Criminal Justice from St. Mary’s University in San Antonio, TX. She teaches courses in the field of criminal justice. 

Amber Tierney earned her Ph.D. at University of California, Irvine. Her dissertation examines how citizenship policies leave lasting path-dependent effects, which bind future collective action attempts, and influence political and media-based outcomes. Her other research interests include technology, immigration, race/ethnicity, and public sociology. Her work has appeared in Mobilization; Research in Social Movements, Conflict, and Change; Sociology Compass and in edited volumes, such as Players and Arenas: The Interactive Dynamics of Protest and in The Oxford Handbook of U.S. Social Policy. She has an MA in Political Science from the University of California, Riverside and an MA in Public Policy from California Polytechnic State University. She teaches courses in the fields of political sociology, social movements/social justice, qualitative methods, immigration, and media/technology.