The following are among the new faculty members at the University. Others will be introduced periodically in this space.
Patricia L. Kohl, Ph.D., joins the George Warren Brown School of Social Work as assistant professor. Kohl earned a doctorate from the University of North Carolina, where she also served as a research assistant for the National Survey of Child and Adolescent Well-being. Her past positions include clinical director at Children’s Place Inc. and mental health counselor at Aiken-Barnwell Mental Health Center, both located in Aiken, S.C. A consulting editor for the journal Social Work, Kohl studies the link between child welfare and domestic violence, and safety from repeated neglect and abuse.
Ramesh Raghavan, M.D., Ph.D., serves as assistant professor in both the George Warren Brown School of Social Work and the Department of Psychiatry in the School of Medicine. He earned a medical degree from Stanley Medical College, Madras, India, and completed a psychiatric residency at the Kasturba Medical College Hospital, Manipal, India. He received fellowship training in pediatric pain at the University of California, Los Angeles, where he earned a doctorate in health policy. Raghavan previously worked as policy core director at the UCLA-Duke University National Center for Child Traumatic Stress. His research centers on policies that promote access to, and raise the standards of, mental health services for children in the child welfare system.
Matt Gabel, Ph.D., joins the Department of Political Science in Arts & Sciences as associate professor. He earned a doctorate in political science from the University of Rochester in 1994. He also completed a master’s degree in advanced European studies at the College of Europe in Brugge, Belgium. He spent 1996-98 at the University of Michigan as a Robert Wood Johnson Foundation Scholar in Health Policy Research. His research interests include the political economy of European integration, the political consequences of electoral laws, comparative democratic processes and American health policy. He is associate editor of the Journal of European Union Politics.
Melanie Springer, Ph.D., joins the Department of Political Science as assistant professor. She earned a doctorate in political science from Columbia University in 2006. She specializes in American politics and quantitative methods. Her teaching and research interests include voting and elections, political institutions, state politics and policymaking, American political development, Congress and political parties.
Robert Walker, Ph.D., joins the Department of Political Science and the Program in Applied Statistics and Computation as assistant professor. He earned a doctorate in political science from the University of Rochester in 2005. His research interests are political methodology (interdependent choice and path dependence), international relations (international political economy and international human rights) and political economy.