The Dissertation|Editor Team

Allen Roda, PhD

CEO and Editor-in-Chief

PhD, NYU
MA, Columbia University

Dr. Roda oversees operations at Dissertation Editor. A former professor and alumnus of Columbia and NYU, Dr. Roda earned his master’s degree and PhD in Music and Anthropology. Passionate about helping students expand their knowledge and succeed, Allen works closely with D|E's management team to ensure our clients receive the highest quality of service. Allen is the Wall Street Journal bestselling author of PhDone: A Professional Dissertation Editor's Guide to Writing Your Doctoral Thesis and Earning Your PhD. 

Learn more about Dr. Roda on LinkedIn and Instagram.

Lauren Saunders, PhD

Vice President of Editing and Research

PhD, Literary Studies, University of Denver
M.Phil., Irish Writing, Trinity College Dublin
BA, Creative Writing, Chapman University
BFA, Dance, Chapman University

Drawing on a more than a decade of experience consulting in university writing centers, teaching literature / writing courses, and working as a freelance editor, Dr. Saunders is committed to assisting writers with every stage of the dissertation process. From addressing the minutia of formatting and citation to coaching writers in idea development, Dr. Saunders is responsible for pairing each client with an exemplary editor and ensuring that the process runs smoothly and all clients receive the individualized support they need as they work toward their academic goals. Lauren is the Wall Street Journal bestselling author of PhDone: A Professional Dissertation Editor's Guide to Writing Your Doctoral Thesis and Earning Your PhD. 

Learn more about Lauren on LinkedIn and Instagram.

Rushika De Bruin

Vice President of Statistics and Data Analysis

Learn more about Rushika on LinkedIn.

Anna Malik, PhD

Senior Managing Editor

PhD, Music and Sound Studies, New York University (ABD)
MA, Social Anthropology, Queens University Belfast
BFA, Music History, University of Wisconsin

Ms. Malik directs the Editorial Production department and is team lead in managing and overseeing all in-process editorial projects in the department’s portfolio. With over six years of experience in editorial project management, she is intimately familiar with the academic writing and publication processes, and is able to effectively guide students, researchers, and authors through the ups and downs of their project journeys. Originally trained as an anthropologist, historian, and musician, she has taught courses at NYU and held academic fellowships that have taken her to live and work on four continents.

Regina Forner

Office Manager

BA Communications, Augusta University

Regina Forner has been an Administrative Assistant for more than 3 years with a background in Journalism. As our first line of defense, she oversees and coordinates daily operations to ensure the smooth functioning of our front office

Learn more about Regina on LinkedIn.

Marquita Hockaday, PhD

Publication Specialist

PhD, Curriculum Leadership, William and Mary
MPS, Publishing, George Washington University
MFA, Creative Writing, Fairleigh Dickinson University
MEd, Reading Curriculum and Instruction, University of Phoenix
BA, History Education, Old Dominion University

Dr. Marquita Hockaday is Dissertation Editor’s Publication Specialist. As a member of the Academic Publishing team, she reviews and evaluates projects for Dissertation Editor to ensure they are ready to be sent to our highly skilled editors and completed with fidelity. Because of her passion for all things writing, publishing, and research, Dr. Hockaday is dedicated to helping authors navigate the complex world of academic publishing. She brings a meticulous eye for detail and a deep understanding of scholarly communication, ensuring that every project meets the highest standards of quality and rigor. Her commitment to excellence and her supportive approach make her an invaluable resource for authors seeking to share their research with the world.

Dr.  Hockaday has an extensive background in publishing, research, and writing, which she brings to her role as a Publication Specialist. With over 15 years of experience in academia, Dr. Hockaday has taught at various universities, offering courses in writing, research, and education. Throughout her career, Dr. Hockaday has remained deeply committed to supporting students, particularly those from diverse and marginalized backgrounds. Her dedication to fostering academic success among these students has been a driving force in her teaching and mentoring roles. This passion for equity in education informs her approach to publishing, where she strives to amplify diverse voices and perspectives in academic discourse.

Learn more about Marquita on LinkedIn

Ian Bailey, PhD

Lead Academic Assessment

Ph.D., Geological Sciences, University College London
MSci, Geological Sciences, University College London
Postgraduate Certificate in Academic Practice (on Learning and Teaching in Higher Education), University of Southampton

Dr. Bailey has 22 years of experience working in academia; he was most recently a tenured lecturer in Earth Sciences at the University of Exeter in the U.K, but has also taught at the University of Cambridge and the National Oceanography Centre, Southampton. He has published 49 scientific research papers in international peer-reviewed journals and successfully supervised 7 Ph.D. students to completion. Ian has sailed on research drilling vessells in both the Arctic and Antarctic circles and remains an active researcher in climate change and ocean sciences. He has also won numerous awards for his undergraduate teaching.

Learn more about Ian on LinkedIn.

Dr. Miriam Ayres

Editor

https://www.linkedin.com/in/miriam-ayres-a46403142/

Miriam Ayres has a PhD in languages and literature from Yale University. She is a multilingual former Fulbright scholar and NYU faculty member with over 25 years of experience in higher education as a teacher and academic advisor. Her publications include articles for the Arts & Culture section of The New York Times and Granta. As an editor and copyeditor, she has worked on book manuscripts published by Yale UP, Brill, and Cambridge UP. She has also edited scholarly books, articles, and dissertations by writers and researchers from the US, Europe, the Middle East, and Latin America. Areas of expertise include health sciences, social sciences, humanities, and global subjects.

Dr. Parul Bajaj

Editor

Dr. Parul Bajaj is an accomplished professional with a double masters in Economics. She holds a doctoral degree in Business Management with a specialization in international trade from the prestigious Birla Institute in India. With a UGC-NET in economics, she boasts 15 years of teaching experience at graduate and post-graduate levels and 2 years of expertise in academic editing. Her expertise areas in editing include micro, macro, agriculture, banking, industrial and trade economics, statistics, financial markets, phycology and philosophy making her proficient in a wide range of subjects. Her published work includes teaching cases in the case journal and research publications in SAGE and Emerald. She is also a reviewer for SAGE and various Scopus Indexed journals. Recently, she was honored with the best thesis award for my contribution to the field of trade agreements.

Dr. Courtney Baker

Statistician

Dr. Baker (PhD) is a trained industrial/organizational and social psychologist with extensive quantitative methods training. She teaches courses in industrial/organizational psychology, occupational health, and statistics. Her research on aging at work is published in journals like Work, Aging, and Retirement and Personality and Individual Differences. An award-winning teacher and leader, she is passionate about mentoring students through the research process from idea conceptualization to collecting and analyzing data to reviewing written reports. At Dissertation Editor, she has guided over 100 clients with their projects. Many clients appreciate her ability to make statistical analyses easy to understand.

Dr. Molly Barnes

Editor

Dr. Molly Barnes is a music historian, teacher, editor, and performing musician. She earned her Ph.D. in historical musicology from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and has taught courses on music at Durham University (UK), UNC-Chapel Hill, and UNC-Greensboro. She has published her research in Nineteenth-Century Music Review, given numerous talks at academic conferences, and is currently working on a book manuscript about the democratic embrace of European classical music in the United States before the Civil War. As an editor, she especially enjoys reading and editing academic work in the humanities and social sciences.

Dr. Conny Cassity

Editor

Dr. Cassity received her PhD in English Literature from the University of Colorado, Boulder, where she wrote her dissertation about text-based communities among British women writers. Along with having seven years of experience teaching undergraduate writing courses, she has been published in Eighteenth-Century Fiction, the Keats-Shelley Journal, and English Language Notes and has served as an editor and proofreader for several academic monographs and university projects. She was awarded DE’s Editor of the Year in 2023 and has held multiple research and teaching fellowships at the University of Colorado, Boulder. 

Dr. Jessica Engelbrecht

Editor

Jessica Engelbrecht (PhD, psychology) is a postdoctoral researcher at The New School in New York City. She previously served as editor of The New School Psychology Bulletin. Her research on the influence of culture, evolution, and gender on human behavior have been published in journals, such as Psychological Reports, and books, such as Motivation and Morality: A Multidisciplinary Approach. She received the Rock Memorial Award for her dissertation, "To protect yourself, or confront the problem? Moral gossip in the U.S. and Japan."

Dr. Salma Ferdous

Manuscript Development Expert

Salma Ferdous is an academic writer specializing in life sciences. She has a BS in Neurobiology from the University of Texas at Austin and a PhD in Genetics and Molecular Biology from Emory University. Salma has 10+ publications in journals such as Frontiers of Cellular Neuroscience and Nature Communications and was awarded a grant from the National Institute of Health. Additionally, for 3 years, she served as a peer reviewer for multiple journals. Her experience in academic writing and editing helps clients polish their written materials and produce the highest quality journal articles and dissertations, regardless of subject area

Dr. Joseph Hurtgen

Editor

Dr. Hurtgen holds an MA in English Literature from Western Kentucky University and a PhD in English Literature from Ball State University. His research focus is on science fiction literature.

Books
The Archive Incarnate: The Embodiment and Transmission of Knowledge in Science Fiction.
McFarland & Company

Articles
“Revelation and Destruction in Walter Miller Jr.’s A Canticle for Leibowitz.” Jesuits in Science Fiction: The Clash of Reason and Revelation on Other Worlds.

“Fahrenheit 451” in the Contemporary Literary Criticism Series, Gale-Cengage.

“Television as Archive Replacement in Fahrenheit 451.” The Quint.

“Archival Domination in Fahrenheit 451.” MOSF (Museum of Science Fiction).

“Archival Embodiment in The Handmaid’s Tale.” Margaret Atwood Studies.

Dr. Amir Minsky

Editor

Amir Minsky holds a PhD in History from the University of Pennsylvania. He has taught and researched at universities in the USA, Germany, and the UAE, where he has offered courses
in German, European, and Global history, and his research has been published in peer-reviewed journals and edited volumes (for publications, see https://upenn.academia.edu/AmirMinsky). He is also engaged as a freelance translator, and is either natively fluent in, or has a professional working knowledge of Hebrew, Spanish, German, and French. Dr. Minsky provides editorial services primarily in the humanities and social sciences, but has also worked extensively with clients completing dissertations in business administration, international relations, psychology, nursing and general healthcare, as well as submitting journal articles and full monographs for publication in many other professional fields.

Dr. Matt Rossano

Manuscript Development Expert

Matt Rossano earned his PhD in Psychology from the University of California, Riverside in 1991. Prior to his retirement in 2022, he taught psychology courses for over 30 years at Southeastern Louisiana University. Rossano is an evolutionary psychologist specializing in the evolution of ritual and religion. He has published over 50 articles, book chapters, commentaries, and reviews. He is co-editor of two recent volumes on cognitive archaeology and author of six books including Supernatural Selection: How Religion Evolved (Oxford), Ritual in Human Evolution and Religion (Routledge) and most recently Good Counsel: A Walking Dialogue with William James (Rowman & Littlefield).

Dr. Sarah Turner

Editor

Dr. Sarah Turner is a creative, meticulous PhD editor and analyst, with a BS in Psychology, MEd in Counseling, and PhD in Measurement, Quantitative Methods, and Learning Sciences from the University of Houston. She enjoys collaborating with individuals from different fields, perspectives, and life experiences. Her areas of interest are academic writing for diverse audiences, qualitative and quantitative methodology research in social sciences, and higher education. During graduate school, she worked with hundreds of undergraduate students to develop their research projects and provide thorough feedback on their term papers. She provides exemplary line editing, APA 7^th edition formatting, and heavy developmental editing services.