Rate My Professor Olga Sanmiguel-Valderrama

Olga Sanmiguel-Valderrama is an associate professor in Women's, Gender, and Sexuality Studies within the social sciences at the University of Cincinnati, where she has served since 2006, initially as an assistant professor and later promoted to associate professor in 2014. Born and raised in Colombia, she practiced law as a solicitor and barrister in Bogotá from 1987 to 1992, specializing in labour, civil, and administrative law. She earned her LL.B. from Universidad de los Andes in 1987, an LL.M. in international human rights law from the University of Ottawa in 1995, and a Ph.D. in Law from Osgoode Hall Law School at York University in 2004, with a focus on the human rights implications of free trade agreements. Her academic career includes positions such as Friends of Women's Studies Visiting Assistant Professor at the University of Cincinnati (2005-2006), Assistant Professor in the Department of Sociology, Criminal Justice and Social Welfare at Nipissing University (2004-2005), and teaching assistant roles at York University in labour studies and women and the law programs.

Dr. Sanmiguel-Valderrama's research examines the contradictions between neoliberal international trade, military aid, and human rights, particularly labor, environmental, and equality rights for women and racial minorities. Her work features extensive fieldwork in Colombia on the export-led flower industry and analyzes issues like family-work conflict under globalization, feminist mothering, women, gender and law, international women's rights, and women's labor rights. She has held leadership roles including Director of the Americas, Latinx, and Indigenous People’s Research Center (AIRC) since 2019, Director of the Latin American, Caribbean and Latinx Studies Program (2017-2019), and Director of the Social Justice Certificate (2017-2019). Her contributions have been recognized with numerous awards and grants, such as the Charles Phelps Taft Research Fellow (2019-2020), UC’s Latino Faculty Association Distinguished University Leadership Award (2019), Darwin T. Turner Champion Award (2019), and earlier fellowships from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada. She has served on committees like the Latin American Studies Program board and TAFT Student Awards Committee. Additionally, she co-directed a women's project in El Salvador funded by the Canadian International Development Agency.