WMU-Koji Sekimizu PhD Fellow in Maritime Governance
Rebecca P. Pskowski is a WMU-Koji Sekimizu Fellow in Maritime Governance, pursuing her PhD at WMU with the support of the Maritime and Port Authority of Singapore. She is also civilian attorney-advisor to the United States Coast Guard (on leave).
Rebecca received her B.A. from the University of Chicago, her J.D. from Harvard Law School, and her LL.M. in Admiralty from Tulane University Law School. She clerked for the Honorable Charles S. Haight, Jr. of the Southern District of New York and was a Presidential Management Fellow at the U.S. Department of Labor.
Prior to her legal career, Rebecca sailed as a merchant mariner for nine years. Her work on passenger sailing vessels took her to five continents and included service as cook, AB, bosun, deck officer, and relief captain. She is licensed as a mate of vessels less than 3000 gross tons on oceans, and a master of vessels less than 500 gross tons on coastal waters.
Rebecca is writing her dissertation on the ongoing development of institutional compliance mechanisms for IMO treaties. Specifically, she is researching the development of the STCW 95 list of confirmed parties, the London Protocol Compliance Group, the IMO Member State Audit Scheme, and the IMO data collection system for fuel consumption of ships.
Rebecca has published widely on maritime legal topics, including articles on ship recycling, bunker contamination claims, and maritime labor protections.