Dissertations & Placements

We are proud of our graduate students, who achieve remarkable things throughout their time at the University. After completing their degrees, they go on to make meaningful contributions in communities and organizations around the world. We provide a listing of our graduates and their current positions on this page. 

Looking for job placements for our professional MGIS students? Check out the Job Placements webpage on the MGIS website to find out more. 

2025

Mohsen Ahmadkhani

  • Topologically-Enchanced Deep Learning for Spatial Image Processing and Generation
  • Placement:  Fraud Identity Analytics; Data Scientist

Isaac Asante-Wusu

  • "Water for all" in a Democratic Africa: Rhetoric versus Reality in Accra and Pretoria
  • Placement: Geography department at Central Michigan University

Liz Calhoun

  • Mapping the Future: On the Politics of Algorithms, Policing and Community
  • Lecturer in Human Geography in the Department of Geosciences at Auburn University

 

2024

Ruth Burrows

  • Seasonal Climate Connections to Food Insecurity and Child Undernutrition in Senegal
  • Population-Environment Researcher; Project Drawdown.

Joshua Eichen

  • "Racialization, Climate Change and the Birth of Capitalism: 1449-1720"
  • Placement: 

John Kendall

  • "Oil is Where You Find It:  Mediations of Technology, Labor and Value in the Oilfield"
  • Placement: Penn State, NSF Funded, 2 year post doctoral research on the political-industrial ecology of petrochemicals in Appalachia 

Yaxuan Zhang

  • "Using GPS-enabled Activity-Travel Surveys to Understand Individuals' Spatiotemporal Behaviors and Promote Equitable Mobility"
  • Placement:  Transportation Planner at Modern Mobility Partners, Atlanta, GA
     

2023

Gabe Schwartzman

  • "After Coal: Power, Development, and Post-Coal Politics in Appalachia"
  • Placement:  Assistant Professor in the Department of Geography and Sustainability at the University of Tennessee

Matthew Trumper(MA)

  • Multi-Scale Topographic Influences on Tree Growth: A Case Study of Quercus lobata in the Tehachapi Mountains, California
  • Placement: Research Specialist, Department of Geography, Environment and Society, UMN

Judith Avila(MA)

  • Exploring Hydroclimatic Variability on the Red River of the North, the Least Stationary River of the United States
  • Placement:  U.S. Department of the Interior, Missouri Basin Region

Mara McPartland

  • "Schools for Sale: Contested Geographies of Education, Urban Development, and Political Imaginaries in Chicago"
  • Placement:  post-doctoral researcher at the Alfred Wegener Institute in Potsdam, Germany

2022

Anindita Chatterjee

  • "The Knowledge Thief? Intellectual Property Disputes and Copying for Development in India"
  • Placement:  Instructor, Institute of Global Studies, UMN

Spencer Cox

  • "Neoliberalism’s Last Days: Amazon and the Rise of America’s New Working Classes"
  • Placement: Data Scientist at Stantec, a global design and engineering firm

Keavy McFadden

  • "Schools for Sale: Contested Geographies of Education, Urban Development, and Political Imaginaries in Chicago"
  • Placement:  Kelter Postdoctoral Fellow in Urban Studies at the Center for Urban and Global Studies, Trinity College, Hartford, CT

Robin Wright

  • "Liberty, Guns, and Pocket Constitutions: Constructing a White Nation Through Legal Discourse in the Pacific Northwest"
  • Placement: Core Fellow in Environmental Studies at Boston College

2021

Chelsea Cervantes De Blois

  • "Examining Well-being and Vulnerability in Data-Poor Nations: Azerbaijan and Kyrgyzstan"
  • Placement: Climate Change Analyst for the Bureau of Intelligence and Research's Office of the Geographer and Global Issues (GGI) in the US Department of State

Jacqueline Daigneault

  • "Making Markets Modern: Development, Displacement, and the Politics of Inclusion in Togo’s Everyday Economy"
  • Placement: User Experience Researcher, Asset Management division, JP Morgan

Brittany Krzyzanowski

  • "Enabling Neighborhood Health Research and Protecting Patient Privacy"
  • Placement:  postdoctoral fellowship in the Neurology Department of the School of Medicine at Washington University

2020

Maryia Bakhtsiyarava

  • "Household Agriculture as a Determinant of Household Food Security and Child Undernutrition in Ethiopia"
  • Placement: Postdoc in Urban and Regional Development at UC Berkeley

Jacob Coburn

  • "Wind in the Upper Midwest: Assessing Wind Resource Variability and Representation in Reanalyses"
  • Placement: Postdoc in Earth and Atmospheric Sciences at Cornell University

Eric Goldfischer

  • "The Difference that Seeing Makes: Homelessness and Visuality in Urban Ecology"
  • Placement:

Joe Getzoff

  • "Wasted Lands: Zionist Development and Settler Colonialism in the Naqab/Negev"
  • Placement: Visiting Assistant Professor position in the Graduate School of Geography at Clark University

Aaron Mallory

  • "In the Life: Accounting and Triage for Black LGBTQIA Communities in HIV Prevention"
  • Placement: Assistant Professor of Geography at Florida State University

Elizabeth Schneider

  • "Spatiotemporal Complexity of Fire in an Island-Lake Landscape, Border Lakes Region, Minnesota, USA"
  • Placement: Instructional Design Specialist in the Center for Excellence and Innovation in Teaching, Scared Heart University

Uday Kuwar Thapa

  • "Investigating Changes in Forest Growth and Atmospheric Circulation in the Himalayan Region During the Past Four Centuries"
  • Placement: Researcher in Climate and Global Change program at The National Atmospheric and Oceanographic Administration, UC Santa Barbara

Kevin Van Meter

  • "Theory Moves: Autonomist Marxism, Social Movement Publications, and the Production of Space"
  • Placement: Labor Organizer in the Pacifi Northwest, specifically; Internal Organizer with SEIU49

2019

Kwame Adovor

Megan Snow

  • "The Shelterbelt “Scheme”: Radical Ecological Forestry and the Production of Climate in the Fight for the Prairie States Forestry Project"
  • Placement: Program Director for Geospatial Support in the University Library and Adjunct Professorial Lecturer in the Department of Public Administration and Policy at the American University in Washington DC

Hillary Waters

  • "Undermining the urban present: Struggles over toxicity and environmental knowledge in Zambian mining cities"
  • Placement:  Postdoctoral Research Associate with CREATE Initiative at Humphrey School of Public Affairs

2018

Kai Bosworth

Damien Carriere

Julia Corwin

Ding Fei

Jessica Finlay

  • "Cities of (In)Difference: A Mixed-Methods Analysis of Place and Wellbeing in Later Life"
  • Placement: Postdoc in the Social Environment & Health Program, University of Michigan

Asli Ikizoglu

  • "Spacing Asylum: Orders of Protection in a Turkish City"
  • Placement: Assistant Professor in Cultural Studies at Sabanci University, Istanbul, Turkey

Laura Matson

  • "Multiple Sovereigns and Transient Resources: Contested Ecosystems and Expanding Tribal Jurisdiction in the Great Lakes Region"
  • Placement: Postdoc, Grand Challenges, University of Minnesota

Gwen McCrea

Todd Morehouse

Bryan Runck

  • "GeoComputational Approaches to Evaluate the Impacts of Communication on Decision-making in Agriculture"
  • Placement: postdoctoral in College of Food, Agriculture and Natural Resource Science(CFANS) UMN

2017

Laura Cesafsky

  • "Divided Together:  Traffic and Democratic Life in Bogota'"
  • Placement:  Researcher: Nissan Corporation

Alicia Lazzarini

  • "‘Açúcar nem Sempre Doce’:  Reinvestment, Land, and Gendered Labor in a ‘New’ Mozambique"
  • Placement: Consortium for Faculty Diversity postdoctoral fellowship in Geography at Bucknell University

Ben McDaniel

  • "At Odds with Progress: An Analysis of Minnesota's Municipal Tax Legislation, Metro-Area Fiscal Control, and the Taxpayer's Income Conundrum, 2003-2012"
  • Placement: Lecturer, North Hennepin Community College

Sara Nelson

  • "Neoliberal Environments: Crisis, Counterrevolution, and the Nature of Value"
  • Placement: University of British Columbia as a Killam Postdoctoral Fellow.

2016

Dudley Bonsal

  • "Local in Space and Time: Acoustic Environmental Policy in Minnesota and a Fine-Scale Spatiotemporal Representation of Aircraft Noise Impact  on Residential Life"
  • Placement: James Madison University, Assistant Professor, tenure track

Sian Butcher

  • "Infrastructures of Property and Debt: making affordable housing, race and place in Johannesburg"
  • Placement:  Human Geography Lecturer in the School of Geography, Archaeology and Environmental Studies at the University of Witwatersrand, South Africa.

Jessica Lehman

  • "Planetary Sea: Oceanography and the Making of the world Ocean"
  • Placement: Mellon Postdoctoral fellowship at the University of Wisconsin-Madison
Student Name Dissertation Title Job Placement
Basil Mahayni "Crisis in Jordan's Water Sector? Understanding the Dynamics of Institutional and Political Constraints in Water Management and Corporatization Reforms"

Practice manager with Chemonics International (Washington DC)


 
Bill Lindeke "In Search of New Riders: Affective Exclusions and Bicycle Planning in Minneapolis/Saint Paul"

St Paul Planning Commission and a freelance journalist, blogger, and activist


 
Ursula Lang "Cultivating Everyday Life: Yards, Nature and Time in the City" Postdoctoral Research Associate in urban geography at Glasgow University, UK
Katharine H. Kindervater "Lethal Surveillance: Drones and the Geo-History of Modern War" Society of Fellows 3 year postdoc at Dartmouth
Jeff DeGraves "Electricity, Marginalization, and Empowerment: For Whom? And Who Decides? Evaluating Participatory Mapping in Río Negro, Honduras" University of Wisconsin—Eau Claire, lecturer
Catherine Chang "Variegated Geographies of Ecological Urbanization: China's Eco-Cities in Global Context"

Macalester College, Assistant Professor, tenure track

Ilona Moore

"The Work of 'Feeding the World:' from India's Green Revolution to the Paradox of Plenty"
Placement: Bucknell University, Assistant Professor, tenure track

Renata Blumberg

"The Spatial Politics and Political Economy of Alternative Food Networks in Post-Soviet Latvia and Lithuania"
Placement: Montclair State University, NJ, Assistant Professor in Food Systems

Ivan Bialostosky

"Urban Sustainability and the Technopolitics of Order"
Placement: Century College, MN, Adjunct faculty

Chris Crawford

"Assessing Historical Trends in Snowpack Variability Across the Northern Rocky Mountains Using Remote Sensing and Dendrochronology Approaches"
Placement: NASA Postdoctoral Fellowship, NASA Goddard Space Flight Center

Smai Eria

"The State of GIS in Developing Countries: A Diffusion and GIS & Society Analysis of Uganda, and the Potential for Mobile Location-Based Services"
Placement: ERSI analyst

Elizabeth Fairly

"Upholding Customary Land Rights through Formalization? Evidence from Tanzania’s Program of Land Reform"
National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency, Washington DC

Jennifer Kotting

"Baltimore’s Urban Fix: Sounds of Excess and Exclusion in Station North"
Placement: Communications Director, Illinois Caucus for Adolescent Health, Chicago

Jerry Shannon

"Rethinking Food Deserts: the practice and politics of food access"
Placement: University of Georgia, Assistant Professor, tenure track

Omar Tesdell

"Shadow Spaces: Territory, Sovereignty, and the Question of Palestinian Cultivation"
Placement: Birzeit University, Palestine, Assistant Professor of Geography; 2014-2015 Abu-Lughod Postdoctoral Fellowship at Columbia University

Luke Bergmann

"Capital, Carbon, Context, and Concepts: Geographies under Globalization"
Placement: Assistant Professor, tenure track, University of Washington

Adam Berland

"Twin Cities Urbanization and Implications for Urban Forest Ecosystem Services"
Placement: Assistant Professor, tenure track, Ball State University

Stefano Bloch

"The Changing Face of Wall Space: Graffiti-murals in the context of neighborhood change in Los Angeles"
Placement: Mellon postdoctoral fellowship, Brown University; Lecturer, California State University

Dinesh Paudel

"The Double Life of Development: Peasants, Agrarian Livelihoods, and the Prehistory of Nepal’s Maoist Revolution"
Placement: Assistant Professor, tenure track, Appalachian State University

Kathryn Pratt

"Fleshing out Conservation: Performative Ecologies and Embodied Practice in Chilean Temperate Rainforest Management"
Program Development Specialist, Macalester College

Christopher Strunk

"Circulating citizenship practices: Bolivian routes of migration, hometown associations, and development"
Placement: Augustana College, Assistant Professor, tenure track

Nathan Clough

"Constituent Space: Re-theorizing the Geographies of Contestation and Control"
Placement: Assistant Professor, tenure track, University of Minnesota Duluth

Nicholas Handler

"Technocenosis: As Assessment of Efforts to Identify the Sources of Derelict Trawl Nets in the Northwestern Hawaiian Islands"
Placement: Assistant Professor, tenure track, Pierce College

Elizabeth Johnson

"Reanimating Bios:Biomimetic Science and Empire"
Placement: Mellon Postdoctoral Fellowship, University of Wisconsin Madison

Tatiana Matejskova

"Everyday Landscapes of Immigrant Integration in Post-Socialist Berlin: Integration Projects, Othering, and Meanings of Work"
Placement: Assistant Professor, Roskilde University, Denmark

Emily Murai

"Mapping Qualculative Geographies: User Interface Design and the Production of Space"
Placement: Lecturer, University of California Santa Clara

Rajyashree Narayanareddy

Placement: Assistant Professor, tenure track, University of Toronto

Ebenezer Nikoi

"Child Nutritional Well-Being in Ghana: An Analysis of Associated Individual, Household, and Contextual health Indicators and Socioeconomic and Biophysical Environmental Variables"
Placement: University of Ghana

Nicole Simms

"The Counterfeit Consumer: Counterfeit Luxury Goods and the Negotiation of Space and Subjectivity"
Placement: Researcher, The Hospital for Sick Children, Minneapolis.

Kyle Walker

"The Geographies of Local Immigration Policies in the United States"
Placement: Assistant Professor, tenure track, Texas Christian University

Justin Jacobson

"Japanese Transit-Oriented Development: the Framed Market and the Production of Alternative Landscapes"
Placement: Secondary School, Japan

Ozan Karaman

"Remaking Space for Globalization: Dispossession Through Urban Renewal in Istanbul"
Placement: Lecturer, University of Glasgow, UK

David Maralack

"Transforming Sport and Identity in the Post-Apartheid South African Nation State"
Placement: Senior Lecturer, University of Cape Town, South Africa

Moira McDonald

"Political Economy of Agriculture in the Yazoo Delta: how Federal Policies Shape Environmental Quality, Livelihood Possibilities, and Social Justice"
Placement: Program Officer, Freshwater Conservation Initiative, Walton Family Foundation, DC

Iam Muehlenhaus

"Lost in Visualization: Using Quantitative Content Analysis to Identify, Measure, and Categorize Political Cartographic Manipulations"
Placement: Lecturer and GIS Lab Manager, University of Wisconsin River Falls

Samuel Schueth

"State Assemblage in the Republic of Georgia"
Placement: USAID, Afghanistan

Marion Traub-Werner

"Global Displacements: Geographies of Work and Industrial Restructuring in the Dominican Republic"
Placement: Assistant Professor, tenure track, University of Buffalo

Christopher William

"Ecology, Conservation, and Climate-Fire Challenges on Uruguru Mountain Biodiversity Hotspot, Tanzania"
Placement: Assistant Professor, University of Dar es Salaam

Grant Elliot

Placement: Assistant Professor, tenure track, University of Missouri

Debarchana Ghosh

"A Geospatial Analysis of West Nile Virus in the Twin Cities Metropolitan Area of Minnesota"
Placement: Assistant Professor, tenure track, Kent State University

Jason Jindrich

Placement: Associate Researcher, Brown University

Evan Larson

"Status and Dynamics of Whitebark Pine (Pinus Albicaulis Engelm.) Forests in Southwest Montana, Central Idaho, and Oregon, USA"
Placement: Assistant Professor, tenure track, University of Wisconsin Paletteville

David Menyah

"The Informal Sector Revisited: Botswana’s Developmental State and Micro-Enterprise Development"
Placement: Manager, Programme Development, Commonwealth Association for Public Administration & Management, Canada

Julia Rachfuss

"Dynamics of Old-Growth Forests of Minnesota"
Placement: Postdoctoral Fellowship, Mid Sweden University

Jonathan Schroeder

"Visualizing Patterns in US Urban Population Trends"
Placement: Assistant Professor, tenure track, Middlebury College

Shipeng Sun

"Intraurban Migration in the Twin Cities of Minnesota"
Placement: Postdoctoral Fellowship, University of Waterloo, Ontario

Kenneth Blumenfeld

"Convective Weather Hazards in the Twin Cities Metropolitan Area, MN"
Placement: Lecturer, University of Wisconsin Paletteville

Christopher Hagerman

Placement: Bureau of Planning and Sustainability, Portland, Oregon; adjunct faculty, Portland State University

Tiffany M. Myrdahl

Placement: Assistant Professor, tenure track, University of Lethbridge; board member of Women in Cities International

Judith Otto

"Representing Communism: Discourses of Heritage Tourism and Economic Regeneration in Nowa Huta, Poland"
Placement: Assistant Professor, tenure track, Framingham State College

Frank Shockey

"Geography and the Rule of Law in the Making of Two American Indian Reservations: a Geographic Study of Law as a Social System"
Placement: Community Development Director, City of Ft. Myers, Florida; Senior Natural Hazards Program Specialist

Peter Anthamatten

Placement: Assistant Professor, tenure track, University of Colorado Denver

Jennifer Blecha

Placement: Assistant Professor, tenure track, San Francisco State University

Patricia Boda

Placement: Assistant Professor, tenure track, Middle Tennessee State University

Mark Brinda

Placement: Workforce Manager, City of Minneapolis Employment and Training Program; Lecturer, University of Minnesota

Ryan Holifield

Placement: Assistant Professor, tenure track, University of Wisconsin Milwaukee

Annemarie Kiaga

Placement: National Program Coordinator, International Labor Organization, Tanzania

Opportuna Kweka

Placement: Assistant Professor, tenure track, University of Dar es Salaam

Kai-Chi Leung

Placement: Assistant Professor, University of Hong Kong

Elizabeth Lunstrum

Placement: Assistant Professor, tenure track, York University Ontario

Ananthakrishna Maringanti

Placement: Postdoctoral Fellowship, University of Singapore

Timothy Mennel

Placement: Senior Editor and Acquisitions Manager, American Planning Association

Roxanne Ornelas

Placement: Assistant Professor, tenure track, Miami University of Ohio

Farhana Sultana

Placement: Assistant Professor, tenure track, Syracuse University

Kristin Sziarto

Placement: Assistant Professor, tenure track, University of Wisconsin Milwaukee

Annette Watson

Placement: Assistant Professor, tenure track, College of Charleston

Jun Zhang

Placement: Assistant Professor, tenure track, National University of Singapore

Helen Hazen

Placement: Assistant Professor, tenure track, University of Denver

Sook-Jin Kim

Placement: Assistant Professor, tenure track, Kon-Kuk University

Yvette Pye

Placement: Assistant Professor, tenure track, St. Mary’s University

Xuejin Ruan

Placement: GIS/IT specialist, Pierce County Washington

Sula Sarkar

Placement: Coordinator, Minnesota Population Center, University of Minnesota

Daisaku Yamamoto

Placement: Assistant Professor, tenure track, Colgate University

Gabriela Valdivia

Placement: Assistant Professor, tenure track, University of North Carolina

Rafael Arias Ramirez

Placement: Assistant Professor, tenure track, National University of Costa Rica

Laura Smith

Placement: Assistant Professor, tenure track, Macalester College