Emma Hughes, Ph.D.

Dr. Emma Hughes is a Professor in the Criminology Department at California State University, Fresno. She joined the Department in 2007. Dr. Hughes earned her Ph.D. in Criminology from Birmingham City University in the UK, where she also taught for five years before moving to Fresno. Dr. Hughes earned her M.Phil. in Criminology from the University of Cambridge. She has an M.A. in History from Columbia University and earned her B.A. in English from Stanford University. Dr. Hughes focuses in the Corrections option within the Criminology major and she regularly teaches the community-based and institutional corrections courses as well as courses in the graduate program. Her research interests focus on jails and prisons, with a particular emphasis on rehabilitation programs. She is the author of the book Education in Prison: Studying through Distance Learning, published by Ashgate in 2012. She contributed a chapter on prison education to the book How Offenders Transform Their Lives (eds: Veysey, Christian & Martinez, 2009, Willan Publishing) and she has also contributed chapters to edited volumes on prison education.She is currently undertaking research on the role and experiences of community volunteers who provide programming in prisons and jails. She co-edited and contributed to The Voluntary Sector in Prisons: Encouraging Personal and Institutional Change (2016), a volume that features in Palgrave Macmillan's Studies in Prisons and Penology series. Dr. Hughes serves as an advisor to the Fresno County Local Criminal Justice Coordinating Council for whom she conducts research on the dynamics of the jail population. Whilst living in the UK Dr. Hughes conducted research for British charities involved in educational and arts provision in prisons. She regularly presents papers at conferences such as the American Society of Criminology’s annual meeting. She is the founder of Project Rebound at Fresno State, a support program for formerly incarcerated students. Dr. Hughes served as the Department Chair from 2015–2020.