Rate My Professor Molly Smith

Dr. Molly Smith is an Associate Professor—tenured since 2024—in the School of Criminal Justice and Criminology at the University of Arkansas at Little Rock, following her appointment as Assistant Professor from 2016 to 2024. She earned her Ph.D. in Criminal Justice from Sam Houston State University in 2016, with a dissertation titled Age-Graded Thrill Seeking and Informal Social Control among the Clients of Street Prostitutes; her M.A. in Criminal Justice and Criminology in 2012, with a thesis on predictive factors of institutional misconduct and gender effects on violent behavior; and her B.A. in Criminal Justice in 2009, all from Sam Houston State University. Earlier in her career, she held positions as Doctoral Teaching Fellow (2013–2016), Director of the Criminal Justice Summer Camp (2012–2014), and various research assistant roles at Sam Houston State University from 2010 to 2016.

Smith's research focuses on victimization, human trafficking, institutional corrections, and correctional healthcare, particularly the role of demand for commercialized sex in fueling trafficking and barriers to medical care for incarcerated offenders. She has authored numerous peer-reviewed publications, including Consequences of Incarceration for Gang Membership: A Longitudinal Study of Serious Offenders in Philadelphia and Phoenix (Criminology, 2017, with Pyrooz and Gartner), Rape Myth Adherence among Campus Law Enforcement Officers (Criminal Justice & Behavior, 2016, with Wilkes and Bouffard), Officer Supervision Styles and Female Probationer/Parolee Recidivism (Corrections: Policy, Practice, Research, 2023, with Gartner and Cooley), COVID-19 in Prisons: Healthcare Contracting and the Pandemic Behind Bars (Journal of Correctional Health Care, 2022, with Glidden), and Age-Graded Informal Social Control and Motivations among Street Sex Buyers (Journal of Developmental and Life-Course Criminology, 2019). Her work appears in journals such as Journal of Interpersonal Violence, Journal of Aggression, Maltreatment & Trauma, and Public Health Ethics. Smith has received the Woman to Watch at UA Little Rock award (2022), Service Learning Champion Award (2018–2019) from the UA Little Rock College of Social Sciences and Communication, CSSC Student Engagement Award (2017–2018), and SAGE Junior Faculty Teaching Award (2014–2015) from the Academy of Criminal Justice Sciences. She mentors undergraduate and graduate students, several of whom have won competitive statewide Student Undergraduate Research Fellowships and presented at national conferences, contributing to advancements in understanding correctional systems and victimization dynamics.