Meg Rincker, professor of political science, uses her passions and experiences to motivate and teach others.

As a teacher of internal relations, comparative politics, and European and Russian politics, Rincker has always been fascinated by worldly musings. Interest in international experience runs in her family. Her uncle was a priest in Bolivia, and her brother went to the Peace Corps and Tanzania.

Rincker was born in Merna, Illinois. She was an undergraduate at Illinois Wesleyan University, and she received her doctoral degree in political science at Washington University in St. Louis in 2006.

Rincker became inspired to be a college professor during her undergraduate studies.

“I had great professors in political science, and I thought to myself, I want to be like that,” Rincker said. “Reading and debating, I’d like to do this for the rest of my life.”

Rincker places a heavy focus on reading and writing assignments in her class. This includes short essays, policy briefs and debates. She is a big fan of PNW’s focus on technology and experiential learning, so she tries to apply that to her teaching.

“I grew a lot as a student when I did internships and regularly talked to faculty, and I related my experiences to class teachings to see if I was doing well or not. I learned that I’d be able to help students the most through experiential learnings,” Rincker said.

Rincker said these teaching methods are important to her.

“I think there are just assignments that force students to provide evidence and display critical and logical thinking skills,” Rincker said. “Oral communication is enforced in my class. For example, in my model U.N. course.”

Rincker is the author of “Empowered By Design: Decentralization and the Gender Policy Trifecta.” Before writing her book, Rincker observed that women were less prevalent after decentralization in Poland and wanted to test this situation in other countries. To do this, Rincker conducted 112 interviews with women’s organizations and national and gender equality policy makers in Poland, Pakistan and the United Kingdom. This was a 10-year-long project requiring grants from Purdue University for traveling. She collected her data during winter and summer breaks.

“Ultimately, when countries put gender quotas in parliament, gender bureaucracy and gender responsive budgeting, this is the countries’ annual budget requirement to evaluate how the budget affects males and females, then decentralization empowers women,” Rincker said. “At the end of the book, I do a checklist for countries to see which ones have these nodes of the gender policy trifecta.”

Rincker is also the faculty adviser for SGA.

Daquan Williams, SGA president, met Rincker when he first joined SGA in 2015. Williams said Rincker has been an amazing adviser and an overall amazing person. When an entire executive staff was absent, Williams was aided solely by Rincker.

“Rincker split the load with me on everything. Emailing people, setting up our new calendar and making sure everything was copacetic for the 2017-2018 school year,” Williams said.

Williams said SGA wouldn’t be in the position it is today without Rincker.

“She was still getting up to speed with everything she missed during her sabbatical and still did a amazing job. She has a true passion for teaching others and molding young minds. She has contributed to the person I am today,” Williams said.