Kristine Hankins is a Ph.D. candidate in Finance at the University of Florida, where Mark Flannery is her advisor. Her research interests include corporate finance, risk management, investments, and payout policy.

She graduated from the University of Chicago with a B.A. in Political Science and holds a M.S. in Statistics from Rutgers University. Prior to her academic career, Kristine held positions with Merrill Lynch's Private Equity Group and PricewaterhouseCoopers' Financial Securities Litigation practice, both in New York City.

Recently, Kristine was awarded an American Association of University Women American Dissertation Fellowship, which provides a full year of research support. For her first four years at UF, she held the Marshall Criser Presidential Fellowship. She also was an American Finance Association Ph.D. student grant recipient and an invited participant at UCLA's Doctoral Consortium in International Finance, both in 2004.

She has been active with the University of Chicago alumni activities, serving as co-chair of the Class of 1998 5th Year Reunion, as well as other volunteer organizations.