Bachelor of Arts, Purdue University, 2015

Master of Arts, Purdue University, 2017

Mariliz Kastberg-Leonard became interested in judicial politics as an undergraduate at Purdue University. After working as a research assistant, she began her first research project, under the guidance of Dr. William McLauchlan and Dr. Eric Waltenburg. This research project focused on case processing time for abortion cases and was funded by a department research grant in 2013. This paper was refined and turned first into a conference presentation before being published, with the assistance of Dr. Aaron Hoffman and his Paper to Publication course. She also had the privilege of working as an archive assistant at the C-SPAN Archives in 2015. Mariliz then began her graduate studies at Purdue, where she worked on as both an editorial assistant and a social media editor for the Western Political Science Association journal, Politics, Groups, and Identities. While working for this journal and as a teaching assistant for Dr. Valeria Sinclair-Chapman, Mariliz’s interest in gender politics grew.

After graduating from Purdue with her master’s degree, Mariliz began her PhD course work at the University of Georgia. Here, she has been able to further explore her interest in judicial politics, through both course work and research assistantships. Time at the University of Georgia has also sparked Mariliz’s interest in teaching, after reading literature on political information levels of the public in many of her courses. As for her future career, she aspires to engage in research and teaching in universities in the hope of making contributions to academic development in political science.

State Judicial Politics, American Institutions, Abortion Politics

Charles S. Bullock, III Graduate Scholarship, 2017-2018, University of Georgia

American Government

Constitutional Law: Rights and Liberties

Introduction to American Politics

Mariliz Kastberg-Leonard is interested in judicial institutions and their development over time. Her primary focus has been on efficiency in the United States Supreme Court when dealing with abortion cases. She is also interested in judicial legitimacy impacted by congressional legislative action. She is also interested in the impact of gender on the judiciary and its decisions, both in the United States and internationally.