RICHARDSON,
Texas (May 7, 2003) – The University of Texas at Dallas (UTD) faculty member Dr. Paul A. Jargowsky
will become a senior research affiliate of the National Poverty Center (NPC) at the Gerald R. Ford
School of Public Policy at the University of Michigan, one of the most prestigious organizations
of its kind in the country. The NPC is devoted to exploring the nature, causes and consequences of
poverty and policies designed to alleviate it within the United States.
Jargowsky will remain at UTD, where he is an associate
professor of political economy in the School of Social Sciences and director of the Bruton Center,
which conducts basic and applied research on the trends, forces and public policies that pertain
to urban and regional development. As an affiliate of the NPC, he will share his research on poverty
and public policy with other researchers and policy makers through the center’s site on the World
Wide Web, as well as participate in conferences, workshops and seminars sponsored by the center.
Jargowsky is one of a select group of senior scholars
asked to join the NPC because of his “established reputation in the field of poverty research,” said
the center’s co-directors, Rebecca M. Blank and Sheldon H. Danziger. According to the officials,
Jargowsky will join approximately 75 faculty members at the University of Michigan and other researchers
from institutions throughout the country who are affiliated with the center.
“I am honored to become affiliated with the National
Poverty Center,” said Jargowsky, “and I appreciate the opportunity to work with some of
the top poverty researchers in the nation.”
In addition to conducting and disseminating research
on poverty, the NPC mentors younger scholars interested in poverty-related research and fosters outreach
from the academic community to policymakers and policy analysts.
The NPC was established last fall at Michigan’s campus
in Ann Arbor with a five-year grant from the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services.
Jargowsky’s principal areas of research are neighborhood
poverty, segregation by race and class and the effects of economic inequality. His book, “Poverty
and Place: Ghettos, Barrios and the American City,” is a comprehensive examination of the concentration
of poverty in U.S. metropolitan areas. His current work focuses on racial segregation and connections
between suburban sprawl and central city decline.
Last year, Jargowsky won a grant from the Brookings
Institution, the prominent Washington, D.C. think tank, to produce an updated map of the distribution
of poverty in the U.S. Using newly released census data, Jargowsky and his research team from the
Bruton Center have produced an interactive, Internet-based map to enable users to view the location
of high-poverty areas in selected metropolitan areas and track the growth of such areas over time.
The results of the project will be unveiled at a news briefing featuring Jargowsky and other researchers
to be held on May 19 at the Brookings Institution.
Jargowsky holds a Ph.D. degree in Public Policy from
Harvard University.
About UTD
The University of Texas at Dallas, located at the convergence of Richardson, Plano and Dallas in the heart
of the complex of major multinational technology corporations known as the Telecom Corridor,
enrolls more than 13,000 students. The school’s freshman class traditionally stands at the forefront
of Texas state universities in terms of average SAT scores. The university offers a broad assortment
of bachelor’s, master’s and doctoral degree programs. For additional information about UTD, please
visit the university’s Web site at http://www.utdallas.edu.