Joni Schwartz-Chaney

Contact Us

Room: M-Building, M-204
Phone: (718) 482-5940
naturalsci@lagcc.cuny.edu

Monday- Thursday  9 a.m.- 5 p.m.

Education

  • Ph.D.in Social & Philosophical Foundations of Adult Education, Rutgers University
  • M.S. in Communication Studies, New York University
  • B.A. in Communication, University of Minnesota

Joni Schwartz-Chaney Faculty Profile
Joni Schwartz-Chaney

Areas of Expertise or Research

  • Race and education
  • Critical race theory
  • Prisoner re-entry
  • STEM & Black males
  • Racial literacy

About

Joni (Joan) Schwartz-Chaney has been a member of LaGuardia’s faculty since 2011 and teaches on courses on non-verbal communication, race and communication, public speaking, communication theory, as well as the Liberal Arts Capstone Course. She is also an Adjunct Professor at the John Jay College of Criminal Justice Graduate Studies Program. She is a critical researcher, social activist scholar with a focus on engagement of Black male students in STEM as well as race and re-entry from prison, and race and communication.

She is the co-author of Gifts from the Dark: Learning from the Incarceration Experience; and Race, Education and Re-engaging Formerly Incarcerated Citizens: Counterstories & Counterspaces both published by Rowman & Littlefield as well as twenty-six scholarly articles & book chapters, and two documentaries. She is currently a co-PI along with her husband, John R. Chaney, for a Department of Justice Accelerated College Transition Grant partnering with Queensboro Correctional Facility. Her most recent book, Critical Faith: What It Is, What It Isn’t & Why It Matters, was released in 2024. She is currently working on the book Healing Our Collective Wound, about US Christian nationalism and polarization to be released in late 2025.

Select publications by Dr. Schwartz-Chaney include:

  • Critical Faith: What It Is, What It Isn’t & Why It Matters (2024), Fortress Press
  • Gifts From the Dark: Learning from the Incarceration Experience (2021), Roman & Littlefield
  • Learning to Disclose: A Journey of Transracial Adoption (2020), Peter Lang
  • Race, Education & Reintegrating Formerly Incarcerated Citizens (2017), Roman & Littlefield

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