She is a professor in the Department of Art and Music at the John Jay College of Criminal Justice (City University of New York).

[5] In 2015, Thompson co-curated the exhibit "The Missing: Rebuilding the Past" at the Andrew and Anya Shiva Gallery, John Jay College, which included works by artists and scholars, such as Morehshin Allahyari, who protest ISIS and other forms of destruction of the past through creative protests and reconstructions.

[6] In 2017, Thompson co-curated the exhibit "Ode to the Sea: Art from Guantánamo" at the President’s Gallery, John Jay College, New York.

[9] In June 2020, during the protests following the murder of George Floyd, Thompson publicly commented on a video showing protesters preparing to tear down a Minneapolis statue of Christopher Columbus, saying that, "I'm a professor who studies the deliberate destruction of cultural heritage and I just have to say... use chain instead of rope and it'll go faster.

"[10] Fox News commentator Tucker Carlson accused Thompson of encouraging the destruction of public art, acts which she previously described as "damag[ing]... to humanity's shared heritage.