Weidenbaum Center Newsletter March 2024

March 2024

Table of Contents

About our Center

The Weidenbaum Center is a research institute at Washington University in St. Louis that supports social scientific research in the fields of public policy, economics, political science, and sociology. Led by Weidenbaum Center Director Andrew Reeves (pictured), the Center funds faculty research, provides administrative support for research activities, and sponsors a wide range of public affairs programs. In doing so, the Center serves as a bridge between scholars, policymakers, and the general public. Through unbiased empirical research and events, the Center addresses many of the pressing public policy issues facing America and the world today. 

The Weidenbaum Center provides significant research support for faculty in the departments of Economics, Political Science, and Sociology. This support allows a wide array of faculty members to participate in a variety of impactful research, and is of particular importance to our younger faculty who are just starting their research careers. Research efforts contribute to work that addresses key social issues locally, nationally, and globally, and enhances the prominence of Washington University in the academic and policy world. Donations fund our grant programs which support this research. We could not support nearly as much research without this generosity. 

Donate to the Center

Get added to our listserv

SEE SUMMARIES OF OUR PAST EVENTS 

Weidenbaum Center Hosts National Science Foundation Grants Conference

The Weidenbaum Center hosted a full-day grants conference featuring two National Science Foundation Program Directors from the Directorate for Social, Behavioral, and Economics Sciences - Lee Walker from the Division of Social and Economic Sciences, and May Yuan (pictured left) from the Division of Behavioral and Cognitive Sciences. Around 80 faculty, research administrators, and grant staff from Washington University and neighboring local universities and colleges attended both in-person and virtually. Presentations and discussion featured topics including an overview of the grant process, writing a competitive proposal, and information on different types of grants. The day before the conference, Washington University faculty met with the program directors in one-on-one meetings to explore their research projects and opportunities for NSF grant funding.

Economist Chris Varvares is new Senior Fellow at the Weidenbaum Center

We are thrilled to welcome Chris Varvares as our new Senior Fellow at the Weidenbaum Center. Chris is an economist and thought leader with extensive experience in US macro/financial forecasting, modeling, scenario analysis, and economic policy analysis. Varvares has decades of experience assessing the implications of economic and financial data, financial market developments, and changes in fiscal and monetary policies for the economic outlook and finanical markets. He began his career as an economist on the staff of the President's Council of Economic Advisers, working under then CEA chair Murray Weidenbaum, founder of the Weidenbaum Center. He received his MA in Economics from Washington University, and now serves on advisory boards for the Olin School of Business at Washington University and the Walker School of Business and Technology at Webster University.

On March 5, the Weidenbaum Center hosted a forum on education policy, addressing topics including socioeconomic inequality in suburbia and what it mean for schools, and bridging the urban-suburban binary in black education. Featured experts were University of Missouri-St. Louis Professor Jerome Ellis Morris and Nadirah Farah Foley, Assistant Professor of Education at Washington University in St. Louis. The event was moderated by Weidenbaum Center Director Andrew Reeves and co-sponsored by the School of Law Public Interest Law & Policy Speaker Series.

Weidenbaum Center forum on Education Policy

March 2024

Upcoming Events

Spring 2024 events include a talk and conversation on economic and monetary policy by Governor of the Federal Reserve Board Adriana D. Kugler, a conversation with emmy-award-winning journalism professor at New York University Hilke Schellmann on holding artificial intelligence accountable, and a conversation with Dr. Mark S. Wrighton, the James & Mary Wertsch Distinguished University Professor and Chancellor Emeritus of Washington University in St. Louis.

Listing of our Spring 2024 Upcoming Events