Danielle MacCartney Named Interim Dean of New College of Humanities and Social Sciences

Sociology Professor Danielle MacCartney has been named the interim dean of the College of Humanities and Social Sciences. The college was created earlier this year to better align subject matters and increase student and faculty collaboration in the liberal arts. 

MacCartney, who currently is serving as the academic director at Webster University’s Geneva campus, will assume her new role on July 16. 

“Professor MacCartney has been an essential part of Webster’s academic leadership for years and has been directly involved in the creation and management of curriculum development, study abroad programs, accreditation, site assessments, and securing grants for the University,” said Webster University President Julian Z. Schuster. “I look forward to working with her as we launch the College of Humanities and Social Sciences.”

The College was announced in March. It is designed to bring together Webster’s core humanities and social science programs in a single college, providing students and faculty members greater opportunities to collaborate.

“I look forward to working with the faculty to build a new College on the foundation of the shared values of our disciplines listed in the College Charter: free inquiry and debate; equity and justice; academic and intellectual rigor and integrity; intense curiosity and the pursuit of truth,” MacCartney said. “Together, we will raise the profile of the humanities and social sciences at Webster University.”

Programs that will be included in the new College are:

Undergraduate

• Anthropology and Sociology
• Creative Writing
• Criminology
• English
• General Studies
• Global Studies
• History
• International Human Rights
• International Relations
• Language and Transcultural Studies (French, German, or Spanish)
• Legal Studies
• Philosophy
• Political Science
• Women and Gender and Sexuality Studies
  
  Graduate Programs
  
  
• Criminal Justice
• International Relations
• Legal Studies
• National Security Studies
  
  
  

MacCartney holds a bachelor's degree in art and women's studies from New Mexico State University, a master's in social science from UC Irvine, and a Ph.D. in sociology, also from UC Irvine.

MacCartney was hired as an assistant professor at Webster University in 2007. Before that, she was a research fellow at the Williams Institute at the University of California, Los Angeles, School of Law. She also was an editorial assistant at the Journal of Social Problems, published by the University of California, Irvine, where she was a graduate teaching assistant.

It didn’t take long for MacCartney to make an impact at Webster. By 2008 – one year after being added to the faculty - she was the program director and chair of Women and Gender Studies in Webster’s Center for Interdisciplinary Studies. In 2011, she received the Emerson Excellence in Teaching Award from the Emerson Foundation, and was awarded the William T. Kemper Award for Excellence in Teaching.

In 2012, she created the Women and Gender Studies major and in 2013, she was named associate dean. 

In 2015, she established the first College-wide, interdisciplinary student research conference emphasizing faculty-student collaborative research. That program has since expanded to be University wide. In 2018, she served on a University-wide steering committee to analyze and make recommendations for operational and academic efficiencies. The following year, she created study abroad research programs to Ghana, Thailand, and Costa Rica. 

She has served as a fellow in Webster’s Institute for Human Rights and Humanitarian Studies since 2012 and has been director of criminology and criminal justice at the University since 2017. This year, she was named acting academic director in Geneva. And now she will oversee a new college.