Meghan Peterson
Research Analyst
Meghan B. Peterson earned her B.A. with a double major in Political Science and Religious Studies at Hobart and William Smith Colleges in Geneva, New York. Upon graduation in 2011, Meghan returned to her home state of Connecticut for graduate work at the University of Connecticut. There, she earned her M.A. in Political Science in 2013 and Ph.D. in Political Science in 2017.
Combining her passion for law and political philosophy, Meghan pursued the subfields of Public Law and Political Theory at UConn, focusing her dissertation, “Law’s Haze, Police Ways, and Tech’s Maze: relationships between American law, crime and technology,” on the role of law in policing operations within cybersex crimes. Specifically, she interrogates how lack of clarity within law impacts actions of and dynamics between police and offenders against the broader backdrop of a surveillance-rich, technology-infused, risk-based society.
During her years of doctoral work, Meghan completed two internships with the Connecticut State Police including the Sex Offender Registry and Computer Crimes Unit. Subsequently, Meghan worked with colleagues at IMRP on the state task force charged with reviewing and modifying the CT State Sex Offender Registry in 2017.
After assisting the state task force and receiving her doctorate, Meghan joined the UConn-Avery Point campus as an adjunct faculty member and taught a range of Political Science courses including American Politics, Constitutional Law, and State and Local Government.
As research analyst at the IMRP, Megan collects and analyzes data across a variety of public policy areas and produces reports for use by Connecticut lawmakers, practitioners, and residents/community members. She presents her work at annual conferences, most notably the New England Political Science Association, and is honored to be an Advisory Board Member of the Social Work Law Enforcement Project, spearheaded by Dr. Isabel Logan, Dr. Robert Madden, and Lt. Matthew Solak, which places Police Social Workers within Connecticut police departments for more effective, safer mental health and behavioral health crisis response practices.
