Maxwell School News and Commentary

Shannon Monnat, associate professor of sociology and Lerner Chair for Public Health Promotion, and her team secured a grant from the National Institute of Justice to conduct a study that will provide recommendations to law enforcement agencies on how to maximize the efficiency of disrupting the supply of opiates into communities and develop a model for use in other jurisdictions.

Joseph Kaifala '10 M.A. (IR), founder of the Jeneba Project in Sierra Leone, received World Food Program USA's Fall 2017 Catherine Bertini Trust Fund for Girls’ Education award, which improves access to training and education for girls by supporting innovative efforts to reach and empower girls.

“The purpose of gaining knowledge is not to get a nice job or a fancy house or season tickets for basketball. Academic research in the social sciences should be motivated by a desire to change things for the better,” says Alexei Abrahams ’08 B.A. (Econ). He credits Syracuse University's Coronat Scholars Program for allowing him to take his time in finding his career path as an economist researching the Israel-Palestine conflict.

Maxwell alumna Emily Simonson ’15 M.P.A./M.A. (IR) was one of the recipients of the Samuel J. Heyman Service to America Medals, as part of the Urban Waters team, which created public-private partnerships to clean and revive urban waterways and their surrounding lands. 

“The complexity of today’s global environment demands an interdisciplinary and practical understanding of the threats and challenges facing the international community,” says Dr. John Hamre, Center for Strategic and International Studies president and CEO. “We want to create a space where innovative ideas can surface and where the next generation of leaders can start to contribute meaningful policy ideas.”

Professor of Geography Thomas Perreault earlier this month was a visiting scholar with the Elisée Reclus Chair.  The Elisée Reclus Chair was established in the 1990s for the purposes of bringing French geographers to lecture and teach in Mexico, and later expanded to include geographers from more countries. Perreault was the first U.S. geographer to hold the chair.