Dr. Kideste Mariam Yusef is an Associate Professor of Criminal Justice and the Chair of the Department of Criminal Justice at Bethune-Cookman University. She also serves as the Director of the B-CU Center for Law & Social Justice. Her areas of expertise include community-police relations, police accountability and use of force, race and social justice, and performance management.
Dr. Yusef has over eighteen years of collegiate teaching experience including undergraduate and graduate education in Criminal Justice, Sociology, and African American/African Studies. She also has decades of experience working with police departments and residents to enhance collective efficacy and improve community-police relations in vulnerable communities.
Dr. Yusef served as the 1st Police Accountability Fellow for the Center for Race, Crime, and Justice at John Jay College, New York from 2004-2008 and the 2010-2011 Emerging Scholar for the Consortium for Police Leadership in Equity program at the University of California, Los Angeles. Most recently, she was selected as an Orlando Magic Social Justice Game Changer and received a Presidential Award from the National Association of Blacks in Criminal Justice.
Dr. Yusef has presented or supervised over fifty academic presentations at national, regional, and university conferences, and facilitated over thirty forums and training workshops including those delivered on behalf of the Trinidad and Tobago Prison Service, Jacksonville Sheriff’s Office, Orange County Government, Hillsborough County Government, the City of Orlando, Orlando Police Department, Volusia County Sheriff’s Office, American Federation of Government Employees, Seminole County Sheriff’s Office and the Jacksonville Jaguars sports organization.
Dr. Yusef has been featured in several news stories on CRT including “School Board Recalls: Critical Race Theory” on The National Desk, “State Teachers’ Union Calls Out Gov. DeSantis’ Critical Race Theory Ban” on CBS News 12 West Palm Beach, and “DeSantis Attacks ‘Critical Race Theory’ as State Looks to Change Teaching Guidelines” in the Miami Herald. She was also featured as a radio guest on NPR/WMFE in a story entitled “Bethune-Cookman Professor on Math Textbook Ban” and on a special issue of First Artist Media with guest host Judge Hubert Grimes discussing CRT.
Dr. Yusef received her B.S. in Criminal Justice and M.A. in Applied Sociology from Old Dominion University, a M.A. and Ph.D. in Criminal Justice with a concentration in Law, Policy, and Practice from The Graduate Center/John Jay College of Criminal Justice.
