Rachel L. Austin
Blue Ridge Community College (NC)
Rachel L. Austin is a faculty instructor in sociology and psychology at Blue Ridge Community College. She has been a lecturer/instructor at a variety of higher-education institutions, including a state university, private four-year college, several technical colleges, and multiple community colleges throughout central and western North Carolina and the upper Piedmont of South Carolina. Rachel holds a master’s degree in sociology from the University of North Carolina at Charlotte and a master’s degree in psychology (forensic track) from the University of North Dakota at Grand Forks. She completed her undergraduate work at the University of South Carolina Upstate, where she earned bachelor’s degrees in sociology and psychology (experimental track), and was the recipient of the C. Wright Mills Award in Sociology. She has been awarded grants for presenting original research, positional works, and pedagogical methods at a variety of conferences across the U.S. and abroad, in both traditional and digital format. Her work has been published in the refereed academic journals Sociological Inquiry and The Journal for Animal Ethics. She is an expert reviewer for Oxford University Press in the areas of social movements and criminology.
