Newswise — Criminologist Alex Piquero has won the 2011 Academy Fellow Award from the Academy of Criminal Justice Sciences (ACJS), and it’s no wonder. Piquero ranks No. 1 in the nation for scholarly contributions to his field, and so does The Florida State University College of Criminology and Criminal Justice, where he and other top-ranked faculty are bringing research to life.
“Because the Academy Fellow Award recognizes distinguished contributions to criminal justice education and scholarship, it is hard to imagine a recipient more deserving than Professor Alex Piquero,” said College of Criminology and Criminal Justice Dean Thomas G. Blomberg.
“His teaching, research and service to the criminological profession are truly exceptional, and his record of successful research and publication collaborations with students and colleagues alike make him an outstanding role model,” Blomberg said. “For these reasons and more Alex has earned this high honor from one of our discipline’s two leading professional societies.”
Piquero’s No. 1 rankings appear in a study published in a recent, special issue of the Journal of Criminal Justice Education that examines the performances of U.S. criminology programs and faculty.
The productivity rating is based on the number of articles for which he served as the sole or lead author that were published between 2000 and 2009 in the eight leading criminology and criminal justice journals. His impact rating is derived from the number of times –– more than 5,000 so far –– that other scholars have cited his research in their own published work. And they’ve had plenty of material to cite. In the 15 years since he earned his Ph.D. in 1996, more than 200 articles authored or coauthored by Piquero have landed in his discipline’s major journals.
His achievements reflect the caliber of criminology’s intellectual community at Florida State, Blomberg said.
A cadre of nationally prominent faculty –– many of them still relatively young –– now has propelled the College of Criminology and Criminal Justice to its own set of No. 1 rankings. Other recent studies also appearing in the Journal of Criminal Justice Education show that the Florida State program leads its national counterparts in no less than three key measures: • Overall faculty productivity• The acquisition of external funding• The number of published journal articles by recent doctoral graduates
“Clearly we have recruited a stellar faculty,” said Blomberg, “which accounts for the recent confirmation of our college as the finest criminology program in the country.”
In fact, the scholarly productivity study that ranks Piquero No. 1 lists Florida State criminology Professor Daniel Mears in the No. 2 spot. Several other highly productive and increasingly prominent Florida State criminologists, including associate professors Kevin M. Beaver and Carter Hay, are listed among the Top 15 and Top 25, respectively. Another study in the same Journal of Criminal Justice Education issue ranks FSU Associate Professor Nicole Piquero among the nation’s leading female criminologists. Blomberg said even rankings as significant as these present only a partial picture of the college’s eminent faculty and their research and leadership on the public policy front.
The Academy of Criminal Justice Sciences will formally recognize Piquero as the 2011 Academy Scholar at its next annual meeting, scheduled for March 1-5 in Toronto.
“I am deeply honored and humbled by this recognition,” Piquero said. “I owe it in large part to the unmatched intellectual environment, collegiality and support that enables my Florida State criminology colleagues, students and I to thrive as we do.
As a professor, I couldn’t ask for anything more rewarding than teaching students, sharing my excitement for criminological issues with them, seeing them continue their education and become academics and policymakers, and then knowing that they in turn are mentoring their students and collaborating with colleagues.”
So far, Piquero has more than 20 articles slated for journal publication in 2011. The Michael Vick case is the focus of one forthcoming paper (coauthored with FSU criminologists Marc Gertz and Nicole Piquero and two graduate students); another paper (coauthored with Nicole Piquero) examines the potential cost of identity theft prevention.
In the next few years, Piquero plans to focus on research that sheds light on the reasons individuals engage in crime –– and why some of them continue while some of them stop.
“Understanding the ‘why’ behind what people do is integral and necessary before we can develop and implement public policies that are cost-effective and beneficial to all,” he said.
Piquero is Florida State University’s Gordon P. Waldo Professor of Criminology. He also serves as coeditor of the Journal of Quantitative Criminology. In addition, he holds the position of adjunct professor in the Key Centre for Ethics, Law, Justice, and Governance at Australia’s Griffith University.
Among his previous honors are the American Society of Criminology’s Young Scholar and E-Mail Mentor of the Year recognitions. He also has received numerous teaching awards. His articles have appeared in the most prestigious journals in criminology, psychology, sociology and public health; and Cambridge University Press has published his coauthored book, “Key Issues in Criminal Careers Research: New Analyses from the Cambridge Study in Delinquent Development.” Piquero is a member of more than a dozen editorial boards of journals in criminology and sociology. He has given testimony before the U.S. Congress on evidence-based crime prevention practices in the area of early-family/parent training programs, and has provided counsel and support to several local, state, national and international criminal justice agencies.
Visit www.criminology.fsu.edu/ to learn more.