Faculty member named editor of journal’s contemporary social problems section

The American Sociological Association’s Teaching Resources and Innovations Library for Sociology (TRAILS) has named Matthew McLeskey, assistant professor of criminal justice at SUNY Oswego, as the editor of the contemporary social problems section.  

McLeskey serves on the editorial board of Teaching Sociology, also writing books and film reviews for the journal; reviewed journal articles for Journal of Criminal Justice Education; served on the American Sociological Association Teaching & Learning Section’s Annual Meeting Pre-Conference Committee; and has reviewed textbooks for Routledge and Cengage. 

He also took part in a National Endowment for the Humanities summer seminar hosted by the Rust Belt Humanities Lab, which focused on the importance of regional storytelling in fostering a sense of place.

McLeskey’s newest position on the editorial board is a three-year term, as he will review materials that are submitted to TRAILS in his areas of expertise and will  help recruit submissions to help build quality content in those areas. 

He became familiar with the TRAILS database in 2024 while working with colleagues to construct a repository in the university’s learning management system (Brightspace) with active learning resources for an “Introduction to Criminal Justice”  course. 

“The Course Activities by Topic module has over 40 in-class activities spanning each topic covered in ‘Introduction to Criminal Justice’: social control, law enforcement, court procedures, restorative justice, criminological theory, etc.,” McLeskey noted in the cover letter of his successful application for the post. “This broadened the resources to allow instructors to teach students how criminal justice both responds to and causes problems in society. Many of the activities came from TRAILS.” 

McLeskey joined the Oswego faculty in 2022 after defending his Ph.D. in sociology at the University of Buffalo with expertise spanning criminology, intersectional inequalities, environmental justice, urban sociology and social theory.

-- Written by Gianna Cowell of the Class of 2026