Susan Welch

Susan Welch is Dean of the College of the Liberal Arts and Professor of Political Science at the Pennsylvania State University, positions she has held since 1991.  Before joining Penn State, she was the Carl A. Happold Professor of Political Science at the University of Nebraska Lincoln.

Professor Welch received her B.A. degree in history and her M.A. and Ph.D. degrees in political science, all from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.  Upon receiving her Ph.D. in 1970, she took a position at the University of Nebraska, where she taught until moving to Penn State.

Professor Welch is a specialist in American politics, particularly urban, ethnic and women's politics.  She is the author of nearly 150 scholarly articles and six books, tow textbooks (including an American government textbook now in its tenth edition), and three edited collections.  Her most recent books include Affirmative Action and Minority Enrollments: The Impact of Bakke on Medical and Law Schools, co-authored with John Gruhl and published in 1998 by the University of Michigan Press; and Race and Place: Residence and Race Relations in an American City, co-authored with Lee Sigelman, Tim Bledsoe, and Michael Combs and published by Cambridge University Press in 2001.  Her work has been funded by the National Science Foundation, the National Institutes of Mental Health, and the National Institute of Justice.