Biography

I am a social stratification scholar primarily interested in the intergenerational and social psychological sources of young adults’ educational attainments.  I received my PhD in Sociology and Social Policy from the University of Wisconsin-Madison in 2009.  Post-dissertation, I received a Robert Wood Johnson Scholar in Health Policy fellowship and am now an Assistant Professor of Sociology at the University of Notre Dame.  I currently teach courses in statistics, social stratification, and higher education.
In previous work, I evaluated youths’ educational expectation formation and decision making.  Contrary to Bayesian Learning Theory, I find that educational expectations are relatively inert in the face of new information about academic performance, suggesting that role modeling and other, similar social psychological processes are the main drivers in educational decision making.  I also studied the intergenerational transmission of college quantity and quality in previous work.  I find college quality largely aids the reproduction of educational advantage across generations, particularly in the case of selective college attendance.  Institutions with low tuition and open enrollment, like community colleges, do not lead to educational upgrading in the next generation and thereby offset educational advantage reproduced across generations in selective colleges.  Instead, I find the bachelor’s degree is the only avenue of college quality upgrading, increasing the probability a child will attend a selective four-year college or university, even if the parent did not.
During my time at the EUI, I will extend my research on the intergenerational transmission of education to the study of educational and economic family dynasties.