Roberts's critical scholarship aims to diversify planning history, expose promising replicable grassroots preservation practices, and amplify minority communities' concerns in policy arenas. Roberts teaches planning history and theory and an interdisciplinary course for planners and architects called Cultural Landscapes and Ethnographic Methods. Her work has been published in the Journal of Planning History, and she is currently developing a book proposal. She is also a guest curator for the Institute of Texan Cultures' Black Settlements exhibition.