Joseph A. Coll

Assistant Professor of Political Science, The College of Wooster

Welcome! My name is Joseph Coll, and I am a recent graduate from the University of Iowa, current  Assistant Professor of Political Science at the College of Wooster.

My research examines the factors that influence the access and administration of elections, how that access and administration affects political behavior and public opinion, and how this then goes on to affect public policy. My work focuses on the general American public, as well as racial, ethnic, and youth groups. My dissertation examined how election access and administration affect the voting behavior of young Black, Latino, and white Americans; how to harness the diffusion of election reforms as a method of causal inference in reform effects; and whether Black and Latino collective descriptive representation mediate the impact of voter identification requirements.

In the last three years, I have co-edited a book on how COVID-19 affected the 2020 election (w. Dr. J. Anthony, Fall 2023), had ten articles published or accepted for publication— including in American Politics Research; Election Law Journal: Rules, Politics, and Policy; Journal of Race, Ethnicity, and Politics; and Politics, Groups, and Identities —, an edited chapter in the forthcoming 12th edition of "Politics in the American States", with additional works appearing in policy briefs, political science blogs, podcasts, and news articles. 

I have received numerous fellowships, grants, and awards, including two Tom Carsey Scholar Grants, two Underrepresented Minority fellowships, and four highly competitive fellowships. I recently provided expert testimony to the Tennessee Advisory Committee to the United States Commission on Civil Rights regarding voting and civil rights in Tennessee. I also organized/chaired (with Dr. Enrijeta Shino) the 2023 Election Science Conference within a Conference at the Annual Meeting of the Southern Political Science Association.

I have designed and taught courses over Introduction to American Politics, Campaigns and Elections, Research Methods, Racial and Ethnic Politics in the United States, and Public Opinion and Survey Design, where I have routinely received high student evaluations and received a teaching award in recognition of my successful my pedagogy. 

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Last updated: 9/26/2023