Now that the Department of Political Science and Geography has merged with the School of Business and Economics to form the new School of Business, Government, and Economics, we welcome a wonderful new group of talented professors to McKenna Hall.
Professor of Geography Kathleen Braden received her bachelor’s degree from Boston University, and her master’s and doctorate from the University of Washington. She came to SPU in 1982. Kathleen teaches courses in geography, global development studies, and Russian history, and is in charge of the Global Development Studies Program. A specialist in Russian nature reserve management and resource geography, she wrote the first English language book on the Russian forest industry and in the past served as a consultant to U.S. firms doing business in Siberia. She has held four separate Fulbright grants for lecturing and research in Russia and Kazakhstan, and served a three-year term on the U.S. Fulbright Commission in Washington, DC. She is also an affiliate faculty member at the University of Washington Geography Department, where she serves on graduate student dissertation committees.
Kathleen very much loves God’s amazing creation and when not on campus can most often be found camping, hiking, and backpacking the mountain ranges in Washington. Not surprisingly, her special favorite is Mount Rainier, where she has almost completed the Wonderland Trail.
Reed Davis has been with Seattle Pacific University for the past 25 years. Before coming to Seattle Pacific, he served as chief of staff at the University of Virginia’s Miller Center of Public Affairs, a think tank devoted to studying the American presidency.
Reed has also been active in state and local politics, serving eight years as the chairman of the King County Republican Party and running as a candidate in the Republican Party primary for the United States Senate in 2004.
He was a regular guest on Ken Schram’s radio talk show as well as Robert Mak’s “Up Front” show on King 5 Television. He is currently a member of the board of directors of the American Financial Services Company, a nonprofit debt counseling company affiliated with the North Seattle Community College Foundation.
Reed is an avid but intermittent golfer and opera buff.
Assistant Professor of Political Science Katya Drozdova earned her bachelor’s degree in International Relations and master’s degree in International Policy Studies from Stanford University. She also earned a master of philosophy degree and a doctorate in Information Systems from New York University’s Stern School of Business. She came to SPU in 2010. Katya’s broader research agenda and publications focus on problems of U.S. national and international security and counterterrorism strategies. She has taught classes such as “War, Peace, and World Order” and “Counterterrorism and National Security,” and supervised University Scholars and Independent Study projects. Katya has previously held research positions at NYU and Stanford, as well as the Hoover Institution on War, Revolution and Peace. Before coming to SPU, she worked in the private sector on defense and technology issues, among others.
Associate Professor of Political Science Ruth Ediger earned her bachelor’s degree from Pacific Lutheran University, and her master’s and doctorate from the University of Nebraska. She came to SPU in 2002. Her current research focuses on active learning pedagogy and the use of technology in the classroom. She teaches a variety of classes, including “International Relations,” “History of American Foreign Relations,” “Global Perspectives on Women’s Issues,” and “The West and the World.” She is known across campus for demanding that students know all the current countries and capitals of the world. (Try one of her geoquizzes.) In addition to advising Political Science students, she is also one of the two Global Development Studies advisors. In 2013 she received the ASSP Faculty of the Year award, an honor of which she is most proud.
In her free time, Ruth loves to do what her grandmother called “handwork”: sewing, embroidery, tatting, knitting, etc. She is an active member of the Seattle Modern Quilt Guild and is currently working on a “scrappy pineapple log cabin” quilt for her mother.
Associate of Political Science Caleb Henry received his bachelor’s degree in political science and economics from Hillsdale College, and both his master’s and doctorate from Claremont Graduate University. He came to SPU in 2003. Caleb is the department’s primary prelaw advisor and teaches courses dealing with American politics and constitutional law.
Caleb grew up in Michigan, which allows him to root for a baseball team which has won the World Series. He is reluctant to talk about the NFL. He has three children, although presumably his wife, an SPU alumna, also had something to do with that. Their four-month-old son has reminded them that sleep is not nearly as necessary as people think. They are members of Blessed Sacrament Catholic Church, which probably makes Caleb the only Seattle Catholic actively researching American Puritan Jonathan Edwards.