The Association of Public Policy and Analysis Management (APPAM) recently announced RSF Visiting Scholar Jane Waldfogel as its new president-elect. A professor of social work and public affairs at Columbia University School of Social Work and a visiting professor at the Centre for Analysis of Social Exclusion at the London School of Economics, Waldfogel’s current research focuses on work-family policies, improving the measurement of poverty, and understanding social mobility across countries.  In her role on the leadership council of APPAM, she will oversee their 2014 Fall Research Conference.

Waldfogel is currently spending the 2013-2014 academic year in residence at the Russell Sage Foundation as part of a working group with Bruce Bradbury, Miles Corak, and Elizabeth Washbrook. The team will write a book on the transmission of inequality across generations, comparing the development of children in Australia, Canada, the U.K., and the U.S. to analyze differences in school achievement among children of different socioeconomic status in these four countries. They will also examine whether achievement gaps between rich and poor children are related to differences between countries in public policies, private resources, and educational institutions.

Waldfogel is also the author of the RSF book Britain’s War on Poverty, and the author of the chapter “The Safety Net for Families with Children” in the Foundation’s new book, Legacies of the War on Poverty. Click here to read her interview on how the War on Poverty continues to help families.