I completed a BA in Russian/Sociology and Honors in Sociology at the University of Western Ontario in London, Ontario.  I completed an MA and a PhD in Sociology at the University of Toronto.  I was awarded the University of Toronto Open Fellowship from 1999-2002.  I have taught various Sociology, Crime and Deviance, and Race and Ethnicity courses at Humber College, the University of Guelph-Humber, the University of Guelph, the University of Toronto, and the University of Waterloo.

I am currently a full-time professor at Humber College, where I have been teaching since 2001. I have presented papers on Russian Entrepreneurs, the Russian Mafia and Russian Jews at several conferences (ASA, CSA, ESS, Kokkalis, EGOS) in Canada, the U.S., and Europe including Toronto, Ottawa, Montreal, Boston, Anaheim, New York, and Lyon.  I have published a book based on my dissertation, Russian Transnational Entrepreneurs: Ethnicity, Class and Capital. I have published articles on the Russian Mafia in Contemporary Justice Review, International Review of Modern Sociology, and Michigan Sociological Review.  I have also published articles on Russian Jews in Diasporic Ruptures: Globality, Migrancy, and Expressions of Identity and Studies in Ethnicity and Nationalism.