Knox College is proud to announce its newest tenured faculty members. At the May meeting of the Knox College Board of Trustees, four faculty members received tenure and were promoted to associate professor: Thomas Bell, political science; Roya Biggie, English; Deirdre Dougherty, educational studies; and Leanne Trapedo Sims, peace and justice studies

“For a faculty member to be granted tenure is a remarkable achievement and testament to their academic and teaching achievements, as well as their service to the College,” said President C. Andrew McGadney. “The ability to share the news regarding our new associate professors is one of my greatest joys as president, and I offer my sincere congratulations to all.”

Read more about our newest tenured faculty

 Thomas Bell, Assistant Professor of Political Science and International Relations 

Thomas Bell received his Bachelor of Arts from Trinity University and his Master of Arts and Ph.D. in government from the University of Texas at Austin. Bell is a specialist in American constitutional theory and law, with a research focus on the separation of powers. He is the author of the forthcoming book, The Constitution of Conflict: How the Supreme Court Undermines the Separation of Powers (University Press of Kansas, 2025). In addition to constitutional law, he teaches courses on American political thought, world legal systems, and the American presidency. His colleagues recognized his teaching by awarding him the Philip Green Wright-Lombard College Prize for Excellence in Teaching in 2023. Bell also serves as the pre-law advisor, working with students interested in legal careers, and he is an elected member of the board of directors for the Midwestern Association of Pre-Law Advisors (MAPLA). He has served his colleagues in many roles, including the Student Experience Committee and as an elected faculty representative to the Board of Trustees. In summer 2024, he co-led the inaugural Chicago Term, and he currently serves as co-director of the Etz Family Institute for Civic Leadership and Dialogue.

Roya Biggie, Assistant Professor of English 

Roya Biggie received her bachelor of arts from St. Mary’s College of Maryland in English, master of arts from Georgetown University in English, and Ph.D. in English from the CUNY Graduate Center. Her research examines how early modern literature engages the scientific and medical frameworks of the era, as well as the intellectual trends that emerged from European colonization. Among her recent publications are “Displacement’s Botanical Roots: The Rhetoric of Transplantation in Early Modern Thought,” English Literary Renaissance (2024); “The Botany of Colonization in John Fletcher’s The Island Princess,” Renaissance Drama (2022); and “Sycorax’s Beetles: Legacies of Science, the Occult, and Blackness,” Lesser Living Creatures of the Renaissance (Penn State University Press, 2023). In 2023, she was awarded a prestigious year-long fellowship from the American Council of Learned Societies (ACLS). In addition to lower- and upper-level courses on Shakespeare, Biggie  has taught Empire and Race in the Renaissance Literary Imaginary, Literature and Medicine, and seminars on disability studies and affect theory. She has been recognized by the faculty with the Philip Green Wright-Lombard College Prize for Excellence in Teaching. While chair of the Campus Diversity Committee and the Faculty Experience Committee, she led major initiatives to support her colleagues in their work.

Deirdre Dougherty, Assistant Professor of Educational Studies 

Deirdre Dougherty received her bachelor of arts from Smith College, master of arts from Georgetown University, and Ph.D. from Rutgers University. She is a specialist in the history of U.S. education, with particular research interest in the experiences of black and ethnic Mexican migrant families. She is co-author of the book Making School Integration Work: Lessons from Morris (Teachers College Press, 2020) and the soon-to-be published Race and Place: Desegregation in Prince George's County, 1954-1973 (Rutgers University Press, 2025). Her teaching encompasses American educational policy, history of American education, philosophy of education, and oral history. She endeavors to bring students into direct engagement with archives to understand the human experience through primary historical sources. She has been recognized by her colleagues with the Philip Green Wright-Lombard College Prize for Excellence in Teaching. She has served her colleagues as a member of Curriculum Committee and the Honor Board, been elected to the Ad Hoc Coordinating Committee to study the future of the academic program (2019-2022), and serves as an advisor in the Peace Corps Prep Program. 

Leanne Trapedo Sims, Daniel J. Logan Associate Professor of Peace and Justice; Chair of Peace and Justice 

Leanne Trapedo Sims received her bachelor of arts from the University of Wisconsin-Madison in literature and women’s studies; master of arts degrees from the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee in creative writing, New York University Tisch School of the Arts in performance studies, Fordham University in education; and a Ph.D. from the University of Hawai‘i at Mānoa in American studies. With interests in life writing, ethnography, critical prison studies, and political activism, her research focuses on the experiences of individuals of many backgrounds warehoused in the U.S. carceral system. Her work brings together activists, artists, advocates, impacted families, and the inside community to address transformative/reparative justice and mass incarceration in Illinois and international settings. Her monograph Reckoning with Restorative Justice: Hawai‘i Women’s Prison Writing was published by Duke University Press in 2023. Her teaching interests include Introduction to Peace and Justice Studies; American Crime and Punishment; Life Writing as Activism; Working for Peace and Social Change; and Queer Indigeneities. As Chair of the Peace and Justice Studies program, she has brought leading scholars, activists, and artists to the campus and to the Galesburg community. She created a prison education program through which Knox faculty teach courses at Henry Hill Correctional Center, featuring “inside-out” courses where on-campus students and students who are incarcerated study as peers within the prison walls. For her spring 2026 sabbatical, Trapedo Sims has been invited by renowned scholar Dr. Pumla Gobodo-Madikizela to be a visiting scholar at the Centre for the Study of the Afterlife of Violence and the Reparative Quest at Stellenbosch University, South Africa.