Moriah McSharry McGrath, Ph.D., is a Teaching Assistant Professor in the School of Urban Studies and Planning at Portland State University. She rejoined the PSU community as a faculty member in 2017, having earned her PhD in Urban Studies from the same program in 2013. Since teaching her first PSU course in the School of Public Health in 2007, Professor McGrath has contributed broadly to the university’s academic mission through her involvement in the University Studies program and her instruction of 17 different courses in Urban Studies and Planning.
Her research is guided by a central question: why do some places make people healthier than others? She has conducted studies focused on marginalized populations, including sex workers and people who inject drugs, as well as communities living near environmental hazards. Her work helped shape the practice of health impact assessment, which she has applied to influence housing and land use policy in the Portland region. Her research has been supported by the National Institutes of Health, the National Endowment for the Humanities, and the Sociological Initiatives Foundation.
Professor McGrath specializes in teaching non-traditional students and emphasizes experiential learning in her pedagogy. She has supervised more than 200 student internship projects and led study-abroad programs in seven countries. Most recently, she served as visiting faculty for the School of International Training’s program on climate justice, teaching in California, Morocco, Nepal, and Ecuador during a sabbatical year.
She co-founded the Teach Global Health program at Allegheny College, was a fellow at Elon University’s Center for Engaged Learning, and was named a Fulbright Scholar Alternate to Senegal in 2023. Professor McGrath currently serves on the Liberation Libraries committee of the American Collegiate Schools of Planning, curating resources aimed at transforming urban planning education and practice.
She holds a PhD in Urban Studies from Portland State University, along with a Master of Science in Urban Planning and a Master of Public Health in Sociomedical Sciences from Columbia University. Her undergraduate degree is in Feminist and Gender Studies from Haverford College. Prior to her academic career, she served as a Peace Corps volunteer in Madagascar.