Featured Photo: Professor Britt Koehnlein drinks coffee at a coffee shop in Geneva, Switzerland, in 2024. | (Provided Photo)

After traveling to almost 50 countries across the world to research far-off cultures and governments, Professor Britt Koehnlein touched down in UT Martin’s Political Science and Global Studies Department for her first semester in the fall of 2025.

Since she moved to Martin, Koehnlein has enjoyed the simplicity of living in West Tennessee and its friendly environment.

“I like the sense of community and connection that Martin offers,” she said. “Everyone has been really welcoming. I also really appreciate and enjoy all of the local coffee shops in town.”

Before taking her position at UT Martin, Koehnlein earned her bachelor’s degree in French and political science from Indiana University-Purdue University Indiannapolis (IUPUI), a school of about 30,000, in 2012. She went on to earn her master’s from Ball State University in 2018 and her doctorate from Indiana University Bloomington in the August of 2025.

After attending and teaching as a grad student at the much larger Indiana University, Koehnlein decided to apply for the assistant professorship at UTM because it was on a smaller scale than the workplaces to which she was accustomed.

“At Indiana University, my smallest class was 45 students, and my largest class was 180 students. So, I was ready for a little bit of a change of pace and actually getting a chance to know my students and connect more with campus and the community,” she said.

As a professor, Koehnlein brought many new areas of expertise to the Political Science and Global Studies Department, particularly when it comes to civil conflicts in Africa.

“We were looking for someone to come in and really fill in both regional specialties that didn’t exist previously in the department,” said Political Science and Global Studies Department Chair Carrie Humphreys.

Whereas associate professors Humphreys and Adnan Rasool’s expertise focuses on Europe and Asia, respectively, Koehnlein has more of a focus on Africa because she participated in various field studies in countries such as Kenya and Senegal.

“I did field work in Africa, and I particularly look at what I call ‘low-capacity service provision,’” she said. “My dissertation was about vaccinations and how countries that are war-torn still provide vaccinations, but I look at all types of these low-capacity or more easily accessible services.”

Koehnlein interviewed workers from non-governmental organizations (NGOs) and health administrators from the national governments while on these trips.

Above all else, she hopes she can use her experiences to educate UT Martin students about real-world issues they had not thought about.

“I am creating a new class. It’s for one of the topic courses that we have in political science, War and Peace, but I am going to specifically talk about civil war because it is actually the most common type of war that we see today, which a lot of people don’t realize,” she said, referring to her spring 2026 class, POSC 493.

Koehnlein understands that her students are still young and live in a rapidly changing world influenced by the media landscape and hopes that they can come to their own conclusions by researching current events, whether it’s the United States’ tariff war or the Israel-Palestine conflict.

“We live in a world that seems very close these days. We’ve experienced a pandemic. We’ve experienced all of these things. There’s a lot of news around us all of the time, and what I tell my students is to always verify your sources,” she said.

She encourages students to pay attention to international politics and how its outcomes will determine their futures as they know them.

“It’s this thing that is happening ‘out there’ or ‘over there,’ and what I think is important is for students to understand that what happens ‘out there’ or ‘over there’ does also affect them. But I also want them to understand that they have agency in the world, and they can be change-makers,” she said.

Koehnlein sees plenty of potential in her students and finds nothing more fulfilling than watching them think critically and draw connections.

“The best experience I’ve had as a professor so far is witnessing the ‘Aha!’ moments for students: those moments when they are able to connect the more abstract topics and ideas we’ve been learning to real-world events and experiences,” she said.

Emme Smith, a sophomore political science major from Lexington, is fascinated with Koehnlein’s teaching of certain topics, including the violation of human rights.

“Whenever she is teaching, she will ask a lot of questions to try to get us thinking. She’s very good at giving examples of what she is teaching to apply to the real world,” Smith said. “She’s also very approachable and a very kind teacher.”

Humphreys is also impressed with Koehnlein’s skills and progress and knows that the future holds a lot in store for her—whether it be in advising students, teaching more classes or even hosting her own travel studies.

“I very much see that a travel study will be in her future. It’s just a question of when. It might be a couple of years,” she said.

As a final piece of advice, Koehnlein reminds students that they should not fear questioning news stories and feel free to approach her and any other political science faculty members to inquire further.

“Ask questions. Always question everything. So, talk to your professors, go to office hours, ask them all of the questions. Dig in and don’t be afraid to see what’s out there and what the world has to offer.”