Frank Donohue HeadshotFrank Donohue

Job Market Focus: Academic (tenure track) or postdoctoral positions in criminology, criminal justice, or other relevant fields.

Expected Graduation Term: Spring 2027

Dissertation Title: The Life Course of a Neighborhood: Considering the Nuanced Relationship Between Gentrification and Crime

Committee Members: María B. Vélez (Chair), Eric P. Baumer, Bianca E. Bersani, Demar F. Lewis IV, Kathleen Stewart (Dean's Representative)

Research Summary: 

My dissertation research seeks to map out a more nuanced gentrification-crime relationship than what is currently conceptualized in previous criminological work. Extant scholarship typically groups neighborhoods into one of three camps: (1) not eligible to gentrify, (2) eligible to gentrify but not actively doing so, and (3) gentrifying. I argue that this portrayal, in both a theoretical and empirical way, vastly oversimplifies the process of gentrification in communities across the United States. Using neighborhood-level data from the Longitudinal Tract Database (1980-2010) and the National Neighborhood Crime Study (2000-2010), I construct a taxonomy of neighborhood change that appreciates the dynamism inherent to gentrification. I account for both the pace (e.g., weak versus intense) and history of gentrification (e.g., places where gentrification stalled versus places where gentrification has been ongoing for multiple decades). My findings suggest that the crude nature of previously constructed gentrification categories may obscure the true gentrification-crime relationship. Ultimately, although I find that neighborhoods with certain gentrification trajectories demonstrate differential crime patterns, this process of neighborhood upgrading does not appear to be as impactful compared to when neighborhoods downgrade. 

 
Outside of my dissertation, current papers in progress include exploring the experiences of women on probation in Baltimore (with Dr. Rachel Ellis and Siya Gu), demonstrating how seemingly positive shifts in prison program eligibility criteria can deepen racial disparities in access (with Dr. Sarah Tahamont, Dr. Jordan Hyatt, and Dr. Sydney Jaw), understanding how law enforcement officers perceive heightened scrutiny and reforms to policing (with Dr. Bianca Bersani and Dr. Torri Sperry), two papers exploring perceptions of local and national political dynamics as well as procedural justice and legal cynicism, respectively, in rural areas (with Dr. Amy Magnus and colleagues), and a solo-authored paper, based on my master's thesis, that challenges scholarly assumptions about racial threat theory by testing the role of Latino political power on police-involved killings of Latinos.

 

Google Scholar Link: https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=PwqvWUIAAAAJ&hl=en

LinkedIn Link: https://www.linkedin.com/in/frank-donohue-104861204/

 

Abbey Potter

Job Market Focus: Academic (tenure track) or postdoctoral positions in criminology, criminal justice, or other relevant fields 

Expected Graduation: Spring 2027

Dissertation Title:  My dissertation is not yet titled, but the topic is school discipline, disproportionality and the school-to-prison pipeline

Research Summary:

My research centers on formal and informal school discipline and how these contribute to disproportionality in students' educational and justice system outcomes. I am trained in quantitative and qualitative methods, and my dissertation uses a mixture of interviews and ethnography to better understand how teachers view student behavior and make disciplinary decisions. 
 
Outside of the dissertation, I am working on a paper investigating the school characteristics associated with schools' use of in-school suspension, out-of-school suspension, expulsion, and student arrest. This project uses administrative data from the Maryland Longitudinal Data System. I am also preparing my masters thesis for publication. The thesis focuses on how student race and school racial composition interact to shape students' punishment risk using data from the Future of Families and Child Wellbeing Study.