Faculty members in the School of Public Administration and the school’s Center for Public and Nonprofit Management conduct research that is problem-oriented, theory-driven and interdisciplinary. They strive to study issues that are relevant to diverse stakeholders, including practitioners in local, regional, statewide, national and international organizations, and scholars in public administration, planning, research administration and nonprofit management. The faculty’s research serves as a fulcrum to challenge both practitioners and scholars to strengthen communities.
Research Interests
Seongho An, Ph.D.
- Online and offline nonprofit advocacy and social change
- Digital technology and nonprofit management
- Collaboration between public and private sectors
Thomas Bryer, Ph.D.
- Scholarship of Teaching and Learning
- Ethics
- Citizen Engagement
- Collaborative Governance
Maritza Concha, Ph.D.
- Service partnerships
- Evaluations of social services tailored to hard to reach populations
- Culturally responsive evaluation practices
Claire Connolly-Knox, Ph.D.
- Emergency Management
- Critical Theory
- Environmental Management and Policy
- Environmental Disaster Response and Recovery
- Qualitative Methods
- Scholarship of Teaching and Learning
Christopher Emrich, Ph.D.
- Hazards Geography
- Social Vulnerability
- Disaster Recovery & Resilience
- Emergency Management Decision Support
- Geospatial Information Science
Doug Goodman, Ph.D.
- Public Human Resource Management
- Discrimination
- Public Management
- Comparative Public Administration
Christopher Hawkins, Ph.D.
- Local Governance & Collective Action in Metropolitan Area
- Inter-local Collaboration for Issues of Urban Sustainability & Economic Development
- Capacity & Structure of Political Institutions on Urban Policy
- Urban Resiliency & Environmental Management
Yue Ge, Ph.D.
- Decision Making under Uncertainty
- Emergency Management and Policy
- Urban Resilience Policy
- Survey Methods
- Statistical Modeling
Jeremy Hall, Ph.D.
- Public Sector Performance
- Public Policy Processes
- Intergovernmental Relations
- Public Sector Capacity
- Local & Regional Economic Development
Xi Huang, Ph.D.
- Immigration Policy
- Migrant Integration
- Urban Development
- Policy Analysis & Evaluation
Naim Kapucu, Ph.D.
- Collaborative Governance
- Network Analysis
- Emergency and Crisis Management
- Decision Making in Complex Environments
- Comparative Public Policy and Management
- Leadership
Stephanie Krick, Ph.D.
- Nonprofit Management
- Public Program Evaluation
- Leadership
Kuotsai Tom Liou, Ph.D.
- Public Organization Management
- Public Program Evaluation
David Mitchell, Ph.D>
- Local Government Management
- Implementation
- Strategic Management
- Public Budgeting
- Collaborative Governance
- Public Policy
Melvin Rogers, M.S.
- Human Resource Management
Abdul-Akeem Sadiq, Ph.D.
- Emergency Management
- Terrorism Policy
Luis Santiago, Ph.D.
- Urban & Regional Planning
- Ecosystem Services Planning
- Environmental Management and Policy
Daniel Stephens, Ph.D.
- Transportation
- Public Policy
- Urban & Regional Planning
- Human Resource Management
Kelly Stevens, Ph.D.
- Energy & Environmental Policy
- Environmental Management
- Science & Technology Policy
Angela White-Jones, Ph.D.
- Grant & Contract Management
- Social Enterprises, NGOs & Community Values
- Research Administration
- Research Law
Jungwon Yeo, Ph.D.
- Emergency and Crisis Management
- Migrant Resettlement and Integration
- Organizational Behavior
- Decision Making in Complex Environments
- Accountability and Responsibility
Chia-Yuan Yu, Ph.D.
- Transportation Planning
- Sustainable Transportation
- Traffic Safety
- Disparity Issues in Planning
Staci Zavattaro, Ph.D.
- Social Media in Public Administration
- Public Branding
Current/Recent Grants
The following list of grants and contracts represent amounts awarded to SPA faculty only. Those with an asterisk (*) are part of larger collaborations with faculty outside of SPA and therefore reflect only a portion of the full amount awarded.
New Awards
All of the following grants and contracts were awarded during the 2019-20 fiscal year:
A Secure, Trustworthy, and Reliable Air Quality Monitoring System for Smart and Connected Communities
National Science Foundation
Co-PI: Thomas Bryer, Ph.D., $399,330
Co-PI: Kelly Stevens, Ph.D. $395,377
Shelter from the Storm: Leveraging Post-Disaster housing policy and design for long term resilience
National Academy of Sciences
PI: Christopher Emrich, Ph.D., $299,671
Phase VII- 2019-2020 Enhancement and Update of the Florida Public Health and Risk Assessment Tool (FPHRAT)
Florida Department of Health
PI: Christopher Emrich, Ph.D., $98,999
Assessing Equity in Disaster Recovery Funding
University of Iowa
PI: Christopher Emrich, Ph.D., $96,171
Supporting GLO CDBG-DR Mitigation and Recovery Planning
Texas General Land Office
PI: Christopher Emrich, Ph.D., $77,890
Enabling large-scale adaptive integration of technology hubs to enhance community resilience through decentralized urban food-water-energy nexus decision support
National Science Foundation
Co-PI: Naim Kapucu, Ph.D., $55,676
2019 Orange County Capacity Building for Nonprofits
Orange County Citizen’s Commission for Children
PI: Deborah A. Carroll, Ph.D., $50,000
City of Cocoa Police Department Strategic Plan
City of Cocoa
PI: David Mitchell, Ph.D., $50,000
Enhancing Community Resilience to Floods: A Theoretical Framework of Community Participation in Federal Voluntary Programs
National Science Foundation
PI: Abdul-Akeem Sadiq, Ph.D., $42,544
Bridging Information, Uncertainty and Decision-Making in Hurricanes Using an Interdisciplinary Perspective
Purdue University
PI: Yue Ge, Ph.D., $42,493
Hurricane Michael Impacts and Unmet Needs in Bay County, Florida
Hagerty Consulting, Inc.
PI: Christopher Emrich, Ph.D., $37,297
Comprehensive Resilience Analysis of Shoreline Changes in South Puerto Rico (Year 1)
University of Puerto Rico Rio Piedras Campus
PI: Luis Santiago, Ph.D., $34,862
Developing the Infrastructure for a Puerto Rico Wood Products Team (Year 1)
University of Puerto Rico Rio Piedras Campus
PI: Luis Santiago, Ph.D., $25,256
Developing the Infrastructure for a Puerto Rico Wood Products Team (Year 2)
University of Puerto Rico Rio Piedras Campus
PI: Luis Santiago, Ph.D, $22,744