Political Scientist.

Margaret Teresa Brower is a Postdoctoral Fellow at Harvard. She studies how institutions, organizational structures, and urban spaces shape the political efficacy and engagement of groups marginalized across differences in age, race, ethnicity, class, gender and sexuality.

Margaret has studied how these groups are impacted differently by political and social institutions and how they aim to reconfigure and reimagine them. Some of these projects include:

• A national study of how higher education institutions structure the political development and behaviors of college students

• An urban study that examines how Chicago public and political institutions create different opportunities and incentives for political engagement among young adults by neighborhood, race, ethnicity and gender

• A public policy project analyzing the relationship between social, economic policies and women’s socioeconomic positionality

• Experiments on intersectional framing and the importance of understanding how identity framing shapes constituents’ support for advocacy organizations, public policies, and political action on women’s issues

• A dissertation project on intersectional advocacy among women’s organizations and how they reconfigure our political institutions to better represent women across multiple axes of marginalized identities 

Margaret has published book chapters and articles on these topics and projects (see her publications). She holds a PhD in Political Science from the University of Chicago, a Master of Arts in Political Science from the University of Chicago, a Master of Arts in Higher Education and Public Policy from the University of Michigan, and a Bachelor of Arts in Political Science and Education from Colgate University.

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Public Scholar.

Margaret has worked on numerous public projects over the course of her career. As a graduate student at the University of Michigan she worked for the National Forum for the Public Good in designing and conducting participatory action research. With the National Forum she held focus groups with community members of Detroit to better understand the needs of residents for education opportunities, workforce skills, and neighborhood improvements. The results of this project were written up into a public report and shared a local nonprofit organization in the area. 

She also worked for the Institute for Democracy and Higher Education (IDHE) at Tisch College where she helped develop a national database of national student voting rates, called the National Study of Learning, Voting, and Engagement (NSLVE) and lead a national large-scale qualitative project on college student political learning and development. This research informed multiple public reports and articles that she authored to improve political educational opportunities for students. 

Most recently, Margaret in collaboration with Jamila Michener has written on women of color in the workforce and the role of policies in shaping these circumstances particularly during the pandemic. This work has been featured in the Monkey Cage at the Washington Post. They were also interviewed by NPR and MSNBC on this topic.

With GenForward at the University Chicago, Margaret also co-led an urban qualitative study of Chicago with Cathy Cohen and David Knight. This project examined why and how place-based political conditions of the city determine disparaging political, social, and economic outcomes for young adults by race and ethnicity. A public report was developed, published, and circulated widely in the Chicago area, for which Margaret participated in multiple media interviews and radio broadcasting shows to discuss the findings.

Learn more about her public engagement.

Educator.

Margaret takes very seriously her role as an educator. As a first-generation college student, she has learned first-hand how important educational spaces can be for young people and is personally invested in ensuring that these places are supportive and encouraging for all students across differences in sexuality, class, gender, race and ethnicity. 

With a scholarship background in the political development of college-level students, Margaret has written multiple book chapters and articles on best practices, pedagogies, curriculum programming for student political learning, and engagement in democracy. At the University of Michigan, she also worked on multiple projects with the National Forum for the Public Good on developing better educational resources for marginalized students, especially for those who are undocumented. 

Beyond conducting research and scholarship on college-level student development, she has also taught courses serving different populations. Margaret taught a course at the University of Boston, Massachusetts on community engagement working with students who were mostly first generation and from low-income backgrounds. At Colgate University, she served as a residential adviser for a summer bridging program advising and supporting young adults from racially and economically marginalized backgrounds how to transition to an elite and predominantly white institution. At the University of Chicago, Margaret has served as a teaching assistant for professors at the University of Chicago for the courses: Introduction to American Politics, Policy Implementation, Race and Politics, and African American Politics. At this institution, she also teaches as an instructor and thesis advisor for undergraduates. In this role, Margaret developed her own methods curriculum sequence for undergraduate students pursuing an honor’s thesis and advises them individually to pursue their individual research projects.