Faculty & Staff

Dr. Crystal Brown earned her Ph.D. in Political Science with a focus in comparative politics, international relations, and public policy. She also has a Master of Public Administration (MPA) from Pennsylvania State University and a certificate in Data Analytics from Harvard University.Her scholarship examines the inclusivity of marginalized groups. As a computational social scientist, she uses mixed methods, combining statistical approaches with qualitative techniques to find insights beyond numerical data. Dr. Brown’s work examines real-world problems in politics, public policy, and ...

Patricia C. Agupusi (Ph.D.) is an Assistant Professor of Social Science at the School of Social Science and Policy Studies at Worcester Polytechnic Institute (WPI), Massachusetts, US. Her research interests include state capacity, political violence, and the political economy of development and inequality. Patricia is currently working on her second book – tentatively titled “State Capture and the Politics of the ‘Two Economies’ Debate in South Africa 25 Years After.” She also conducts fieldwork on the rise of domestic terrorism/insurgencies, and China/African relations. Patricia has ...

I joined WPI in 2011 as a scholar and teacher with training in public health, environmental policy, and international development studies. My research and teaching interests focused on the environment-development nexus, where tensions between sustainability and livelihoods often lead to contentious policy debates. My work on soy production and land inequality, expert roundtables and certification, and sustainability rating systems for cities, advanced ideas around how global discourses about sustainable agriculture and sustainability indicators take shape, are mobilized, and have influence at ...

Robert Krueger is a human geographer whose scholarship and teaching focus on creating sustainable, socially just, improvements to development projects in the global north and south. His work has taken him around the world. He has worked in countries in North America, Europe, Asia, and Africa, on issues of economic development and institutional change. His scholarship and teaching challenge conventional notions of economic development, economy-environment relationships, and social change. In his book, Adventures in Sustainable Urbanism (2019, SUNY Press, Krueger, Freytag and Mössner (eds)), ...

Professor Pavlov earned a BS degree in Physics/Computer Science and a PhD in Economics from University of Southern California and an MBA from Cornell University. He has taught at WPI since 2002. He has been to many universities in the US, Russia and Western Europe, but he thinks WPI is like no other university. The project-based approach at WPI allows him to involve students in research projects. He values the opportunity to include students in his research through IQPs and MQPs. Professor Pavlov’s expertise is in multi-sector analysis that accounts for feedback and resistance to change ...

Professor Radzicki is an economist and simulation scientist who directs WPI’s Complex Systems Laboratory as well as the university’s Program in Technology, Policy, and Sustainability. He has developed techniques for applying system dynamics computer simulation modeling to problems in complex socioeconomic systems, and created teachable and repeatable methods for turning these models into user-friendly games or “flight simulators” that can be used by those who did not participate in the creation of the models to understand and control their dynamics.System dynamics is an approach to social ...

 The overarching goal of my teaching and research is to contribute to an interdisciplinary understanding of environmental governance and policy. More specifically, I focus on the building of individual, organizational and institutional capacities to participate in collaborative efforts to address complex social and environmental sustainability problems through the application of science and technology.My academic and professional background includes experience in molecular biology, microbial ecology, wildlife biology, sustainable forestry and most recently environmental policy and ...

Khalid Saeed is widely recognized for his work on the interface of economics and system dynamics. He has published two books and numerous articles on a variety of methodological, developmental and management agendas including sustainable agriculture, poverty alleviation, political instability, supply chain management and system dynamics modeling. His current focus is on operationalization of economic policy so it can be implemented through available managerial roles. Professor Saeed served as the head of social Science and Policy Studies department from 1997-2007. He previously taught at ...

See my personal website (https://followthe6.com) for a description of my work to incorporate Behavioral Economics into Personal Finance.

Dr. Gbetonmasse Somasse is an economist and applied econometrician with field experience as a development practitioner. He is  an Associate Professor of Teaching in the Department of Social Science and Policy Studies. Prior to joining WPI, he was an instructor at Clark University. He also served as senior economist statistician at the Central Bank of West African States and a consultant for the UN Economic Commission for Africa and the United Nations Development Program.His research is mostly policy-oriented and focuses on how economic theory and empirical ...

Prof Stoddard is a human-environment geographer who is interested in the intersection of nature, society, and justice, particularly in the context of climate change. She looks at the ways in which we can design for climate resilience, in terms of infrastructure, location specific practices, and through community resilience. Stoddard also looks at the vulnerability and resilience of food systems to disasters (climate, disease outbreaks, etc.), and the impacts for humans, animals, and ecosystems. She looks at the ways in which technology, policies, and social movements ...