Sociology, Criminology & Justice Studies Office Information
Department Chair: Meredith C. Frey
Location: Towers 213, 1 S. Grove St.
Hours: Monday – Friday (8:30 a.m. – 5:00 p.m.)
Contact: Patti Welch, Academic Administrative Assistant
Phone: 614-823-1361
Email: pwelch@otterbein.edu
Faculty
Heidi Ballard
Associate Professor
Associate Professor Heidi R. Ballard earned a Ph.D. in Sociology from the University of New Mexico and an Master’s degree in Public Health from The Ohio State University. She received her Ph.D. from the University of New Mexico, Albuquerque, NM. Her graduate work emphasized social theory and global development issues, with a regional emphasis on Latin America. Areas of expertise include classical and contemporary sociological theory, global social change and development, and environmental sociology. Issues of social justice are of special interest in her work. Courses currently taught include classical social theory, contemporary social theory, racial and ethnic relations, global social change, environmental sociology, and urban sociology.
Carla Corroto
Professor
Associate Professor Carla Corroto earned a Ph.D. in Sociology from The Ohio State University and a Master’s degree in Architecture from the University of Illinois, Chicago. She teaches community and human service focused courses including Introduction(s) to Social Justice Studies and Sociology, the Sociology of Gender, and Sociology of Family Diversity. Taking advantage of her cross-disciplinary background, Dr. Corroto researches the intersection of gender, race, social class, and disability in architecture and urban design. She employs critical ethnographic research methods in her qualitative work with attention to narrative structure and social justice outcomes. Dr. Corroto is an avid sports fan and is kind to animals.
Meredith C. Frey
Professor & Department Chair
Meredith Frey is an associate professor and experimental/quantitative psychologist with research interests in human intelligence. Two basic questions guide her work: 1) Why are some people more intelligent than others, and 2) How can we fairly measure intelligence, without also measuring learned information? She has received a grant from the U. S. Army Research Institute to develop a battery of fairly simple reaction time tasks that can be used to predict complex outcomes, like academic achievement or job performance, and can be used in place of traditional, more culturally laden, assessments. Dr. Frey teaches classes in Research Methods, Statistics, General Psychology, and Intelligence. Dr. Frey received the 2009 New Teacher of the Year award. Read theOpportunities Abound for Researcharticle fromTowers Magazineabout Meredith’s research.
Leesa Kern
Associate Professor
Dr. Kern received her doctorate from The Ohio State University. Her classes are in the criminology concentration. Her research interests are criminology and juvenile delinquency. She also teaches Introductory Sociology, Research Methods, Social Problems, and also teaches in the Integrative Studies and Senior Year Experience programs. She is currently completing research on women in policing, and has begun researching gang involvement in violent crime in Columbus. Her other research interests include stigma management among members in deviant communities, and the intersections between pollution, crime, and lower income neighborhoods.
Staff
