Syracuse Sun

Several Maxwell School faculty members have been promoted to leadership roles for the 2024-25 academic year. Junko Takeda has been named chair of the Citizenship and Civic Engagement (CCE) Undergraduate Program after serving in an interim role since July 2023, and Leonard M. Lopoo began his tenure as chair of the Public Administration and International Affairs Department in July 2024.

Junko Takeda

Takeda, a professor of history, was appointed interim chair in spring 2023. Her research focuses on citizenship histories, early modern globalization, revolutions, migration, displacement, and disease. She is the author of “Between Crown and Commerce: Marseille and the Early Modern Mediterranean” (Johns Hopkins, 2011) and “Iran and a French Empire of Trade, 1700–1808: The Other Persian Letters” (Liverpool University Press, Oxford University Studies in the Enlightenment, 2020). Her ongoing projects explore migration, dispossession, and ethnic and religious violence in the early modern world.

At Syracuse University, Takeda has received numerous awards including the Daniel Patrick Moynihan Award for Research and Teaching. She was also named the inaugural O’Hanley Faculty Scholar and Daicoff Faculty Scholar. Additional accolades include the Junior Meredith Teaching Recognition Award as an assistant professor and the Excellence in Graduate Teaching Award from the Graduate School in 2023.

Leonard Lopoo

Lopoo is a professor who holds multiple roles including chair and associate dean of public administration and international affairs. He also serves as the Paul Volcker Chair in Behavioral Economics and senior research associate at the Center for Policy Research. Lopoo succeeds Colleen Heflin as department chair.

Lopoo will continue his directorship at Maxwell X Lab while serving as department chair. His research applies behavioral public administration principles to enhance government agency performance. His work covers family-related topics such as fertility, marriage, maternal employment, and social welfare policies aimed at low-income populations. His research has been published in journals like Demography and Journal of Health Economics.

His work has garnered support from federal agencies such as Eunice Kennedy Shriver National Institute of Child Health and Human Development among others. Lopoo's honors include several teaching excellence awards such as Birkhead-Burkhead Teaching Excellence Award.

Additionally Appointed Directors

Three faculty members have assumed director roles for this academic year: Christopher Faricy, Sebastian Karcher, and Amy Lutz.

Christopher Faricy

Faricy is an associate professor of political science who now directs the Campbell Public Affairs Institute succeeding Grant Reeher. He co-directs the American Policy Agendas Project which tracks changes in national policy agendas using data analytics. Faricy’s work includes studies on American politics focusing on social policy issues like income inequality.

He authored “Welfare for Wealthy: Parties Social Spending Inequality United States” (Cambridge University Press) among other works supported by Russell Sage Foundation grants.

Sebastian Karcher

Karcher recently became director of Center for Qualitative Multi-Method Inquiry while also directing Qualitative Data Repository within political science department. His interdisciplinary publications span journals like Data Science Journal with funding support from organizations including National Science Foundation.

Amy Lutz

Lutz is an associate professor sociology who now directs Social Science Ph.D program focusing her research on children immigrants related inequalities race ethnicity education with publications supported by NSF grants among others co-authoring “Parenting Privilege Peril Social Inequality Enables Derails American Dream” (Teachers College Press).

Dean David M Van Slyke expressed gratitude stating "I am grateful these highly accomplished scholars instructors outstanding citizens school taking leadership mantle providing community strong experience deep appreciation mission goals."