Sam McQuillen

Sam McQuillen earned his Bachelor’s degree in Economics and International Affairs from Lafayette College and is working to complete a Master’s degree in Development Studies from the University of Oxford. He was born and raised in Hershey, Pennsylvania. Through his past research and lived experiences, he has developed a passion for studying rural poverty, deindustrialization, and community-centric approaches to development. Outside of academia, he is an avid cook, juggler, and runner. He hopes to contribute to a new paradigm of studying, empowering, and mobilizing local community networks in order to improve human-wellbeing.

Sam worked with co-partners, the Oxford Poverty and Human Development Initiative and Appalshop and conducted research on multidimensional poverty and developed a community-based social connectedness index in the Appalachian region.

Community Engagement Initiative

Sam conducted in-person fieldwork in Whitesburg, Kentucky, and created a baking-based outreach project for his Community Engagement Initiative. After making his famous key lime and peanut butter cream pies, he shared them with community members in order to facilitate bonding over food! Read the report: Concerts and Confections

Report

Identifying Isolation: Assessing a Proposed Social Isolation Survey Through Participatory Methods in Appalachia

Nestled within the hills of Appalachia, Whitesburg, Kentucky has a population of a little over 2000, and a longstanding history of dynamic arts and culture. However, like many locales within Appalachia, Whitesburg has above-average rates of poverty, due to a complex multitude of factors, including exploitation by the coal mining industry. Sam’s Fellowship centered around exploring the role of social isolation as a core element of multidimensional poverty, as measured by the indicators proposed by Zavaleta et al. Sam conducted in-person fieldwork with his partner Appalshop, an arts and culture collective in Whitesburg, to interview residents of Whitesburg on their experiences with multidimensional poverty and social isolation, focusing on ways through which to ensure that social isolation is meaningfully and appropriately measured. 

Keywords

Multidimensional poverty, Appalachia, community connections, rural poverty, arts and culture, social isolation, indicators, Zavaleta et al.