Big Life Changes
Pardon the disruption - I'm heading to Notre Dame!
In grad school, I read Melissa Kearney and Philip Levine’s paper “Media Influences on Social Outcomes: The Impact of MTV’s 16 and Pregnant on Teen Childbearing” for my Gender Economics class and was instantly hooked. I had originally gone to grad school in hopes of working in international development, but once I started thinking about gender I couldn’t stop.1 Over that semester and throughout the rest of my graduate program, I read everything I could get my hands on and wrote my masters paper on women’s sexual empowerment in the USSR. I was also able to bring family and gender policy into my work, thanks to a flexible job and a supportive boss.
Since finishing grad school, I’ve been writing, presenting, and researching family and gender policy as much as my role would allow. But because of the nature of my job, much of what I’ve done has been on my own time or where family policy overlaps with labor and fiscal policy. While I’m very thankful for everything I’ve been able to do, it was becoming increasingly clear to me that I wanted the entirety of my role to be supporting women and families.
And that is exactly what my job is about to become! I’m thrilled to share that I’ll be joining the Economics Department at the University of Notre Dame as Associate Director of the Strengthening Families Research Initiative, working with the incredible Dr. Melissa Kearney.
It is a dream come true to not only be working with Melissa, but have the opportunity to build a research center from scratch. Our goal is to find evidence based ways to support and strengthen families of all kinds. As a University Based Research Center we’ll be doing the rigorous academic work but also bringing the results to the real world through pilot programs, partnerships with nonprofits, and policy change. I couldn’t be more honored to be a part of it.
I’m packing up and moving to Indiana this weekend and I’ll be starting my new role in early September. I’ll be going back and forth between Indiana and Virginia for a few weeks as we move to South Bend.
All this to say, posts may be a little sporadic while I settle into this new chapter. Thanks for your patience as I adjust.
I also write this publicly because I’m thankful to have an audience of thoughtful people interested in family related issues. If you have any ideas for me or want to collaborate, please let me know!
My Substack has always been a passion project for me and it will continue to be one going forward. Unless stated otherwise, my opinions will always be mine alone and don’t necessarily reflect the positions of the University of Notre Dame or the Strengthening Families Research Initiative.
Special shoutout to my professor Dr. Johanna Mollerstrom!
congratulations! sounds great
Congrats- what an exciting move!