After Macalester

Jay Mathias, class of 2025, and faculty member Kahldoun Samman at the Sociology Commencement Reception.

Faculty members Khaldoun Samman, Christina Hughes, Erik Larson, and Erika Busse-Cárdenas celebrate the graduation of Michelle Perez-Lucas, ’25.

Ryan Cotter, ’24, worked as the news resident for radio station KCAW in Sitka, Alaska.

Sociology major Tasaana Hodge, class of 2025, enters commencement.

Leo Corral, class of ’25, faculty member Erika Busse-Cárdenas, and Louise Yang, ’25, celebrate at commencement.

One major, many paths: Sociology graduates pursue a variety of options in graduate school and employment.

In recent years, Macalester students have started pursuing doctorates in Sociology at higher education institutions including Northwestern University, the University of Indiana, the University of Minnesota, and the University of Wisconsin-Madison with the intention of pursuing research in the field and eventually becoming college professors themselves.

Majoring in sociology also opens up pathways to other fields. For example:

• Claire Henkel graduated with a Masters in Landscape Architecture from North Carolina State University and is now working for the university as a Research Associate in the university’s Coastal Dynamics Design Lab, where she provides technical assistance to rural communities in their efforts to be more resilient in the face of climate change.
• In 2024, Aaron (Xunwen) Zou, ’22, earned the Erasmus Mundus Joint Master Degree in Public Health in Disasters from the Universidad de Oviedo / University of Nicosia in Spain. His research focused on migration patterns through the Dorian Gap in northern Colombia and southern Panama.
• Joselyn Angeles-Figueroa, ’21, earned a Masters of Education in Statistics, Measurement, and Assessment from the University of Pennsylvania in ’25 and expects to graduate with a Masters in Social Policy in ’26, also from U Penn.

Sociology majors also find careers in a wide variety of fields, including social work, consulting, and education. Mac Sociology grads who work in the legal arena have attended law school at New York University, the University of California-Berkeley, the University of Iowa, University of Notre Dame Law School, and the University of Missouri.

• Since 2015, Evelyn Daugherty, ’11, has been a teacher in Dearborn Public Schools in Michigan, where she teaches fifth graders.
• Demoya Gordon, ’06, serves as vice-chair and commissioner for the State of Illinois’ Human Rights Commission, where she works to protect the civil rights of residents of Illinois.
• Since 2020, Susana Morales, ’20, has served as a program coordinator at Nexus Community Partners, where she works in curriculum development and facilitation, outreach and engagement, evaluation, communication, and capacity-building.
• In 2022, Joe Schweigert, ’08, joined Hennepin County Human Services as a project manager and works on finding shelter for houseless families.
• In 2024, Taylor Laemmli, ’11, accepted a tenure track position in Baylor University’s Sociology Department.
• After graduating from the University of Chicago Law School with a JD and the University of Chicago Booth with an MBA, Alejandra Carrillo, ’15, works as a Charlotte E. Ray Fellow with the Conservation Law Foundation.

“Sociology taught me to have a knowledge of the ways in which broader social systems and norms impact the individual. As an advocate, I am tasked to dissect, understand, and often challenge those norms. I often think that my job is to be the bridge between people’s expectations of the justice system and their reality/lived experiences in the justice system. Sociology gave me the tools to build that bridge.”

Lane Centrella, ’22, Legal Advocate for Southern Valley Alliance