Invisible Role of Nations in the US Academic Field
At Stanford, I collaborate with the Stanford Next Asia Policy Lab (SNAPL) at the Freeman Spogli Institute (FSI) to initiate this transnational lab. In this project, we examine two key questions: (1) How do migrant scholars establish transnational linkages across borders? (2) What roles do states play in facilitating this transnational process? We compiled a network dataset of transnational migrants and their collaborators, as well as conducted interviews to capture the brokerage activities these migrants facilitate.
Working Paper Series
“From Brain Linkage to Transnational Pipeline: How Korean Migrant Scholars Institutionalize Cross-Border Exchange” with Minyoung An and Gi-Wook Shin (Manuscript Available)
“Studying Up in a Global Era: Methodological Transnationalism, Code-Switching, and Team Positionalities in Elite Research” with Gi-Wook Shin (Manuscript Available)
The Shape of Sieves: How Universities Screen and Why Variation Matters
At UW-Madison, I served as a student-PI leading an investigation into admission criteria across 69 universities. I worked with three undergraduate research assistants to compile an institutional dataset in Taiwan, examining the screening criteria of 2162 university-major pairs to understand how universities screen applicants and define their candidate pools. We refer to this process as the “shape of sieves” to highlight the competitive dynamics among universities.
Working Paper Series
“A Paper on Status Competition and Organizational Strategies” with Hsing-Cheng Chen, and Hsuan-Wei Wayne Lee (Anonymized Title Under Review)
Out of Sync: First Generation’s Pathways in Elite College In the United States
Out of Sync examines how first-generation, low-income students move from elite college into the workforce. Based on longitudinal interviews, the project shows that inequality persists not only because students lack resources, but because institutional support often arrives on timelines that do not match students’ needs. We develop the concept of temporal exclusion to explain how first-generation students can miss critical windows for networking, career planning, and professional preparation even when support formally exists. The project highlights how elite colleges can reproduce inequality across life-course transitions by making opportunity depend on being “on time.”
Working Paper Series
“A Paper on Temporal Exclusion and First-Generation Students’ Pathways” with Elizabeth Lee and Janel Benson (Anonymized Title Under Review)
Ruo-Fan Liu 