Institute for Policy & Social Research Annual Report 2023-24

Thank you.

In September 2023, after combing through spreadsheets and plumbing the depths of our shared server, we submitted IPSR’s self-study to support its review from the KU Center for Research. The report covered ten years, from fiscal year 2014 through 2023. As we compiled the report, we noticed two things: how much has stayed the same, and how much had changed.

Ten years ago, no one had heard of the novel coronavirus. Brownback’s tax experiment was in full swing in the State of Kansas. The  IPSR Doctoral Research Fellows  program was brand new. We saw “Big Data” (with the quotes) as part of the future of social science research. IPSR had 13 employees, led by Director Steven Maynard-Moody.

IPSR’s mission today is the same as it was ten years ago. We are here to support social science and policy-relevant research at the University of Kansas. We are a faculty-driven research center with several interdisciplinary, faculty-led research centers. We have a talented, hardworking staff, and we are dedicated to the work of building a thriving social science research community at KU and serving our communities at the local, state, and national level.

The review committee found that IPSR fulfills its mission and serves as a model for a social science research center. The committee praised our support for graduate and faculty student research, faculty external funding, and interdisciplinary and multidisciplinary collaboration.

I am excited to report that, over the last year, IPSR welcomed 10 new  faculty affiliates  and 7 new staff members to the organization. Our research development team submitted 66 proposals for $17,029,422 and received notice of 29 awards for $6,348,465. We are honored to have supported the  rematriation of Iⁿ‘zhúje‘waxóbe to the Kaw Nation,  and we are excited about the future of the newly-funded Kansas Water Dashboard.

It's thanks to the work and support of our faculty affiliates that IPSR continues to grow and thrive. We appreciate your investments in the organization, and we look forward to the next ten years. Learn more about our work in this report, tell your friends about our mailing list and our upcoming events, and write to me ( dginther@ku.edu ) or Associate Director Jena Gunter ( kujena@ku.edu ) to find out how we can support your work.

Sincerely,

Donna K. Ginther

IPSR's 128  faculty affiliates  are appointed across KU, at the College of Liberal Arts & Sciences, the Schools of Architecture & Design, Business, Education & Human Sciences, Engineering, Journalism & Mass Communications, Law, Pharmacy, and Social Welfare, as well as the Spencer Museum of Art, the Libraries, and the Medical Center.

IPSR's eight interdisciplinary research centers advance the state of knowledge on approaches and topics in social science research.

Director, Ward Lyles, Associate Professor, Urban Planning and Indigenous Studies

The Center for Compassionate & Sustainable Communities seeks to engage in basic and applied research, engaged teaching, and translational activities. Our work centers compassionate, just, and sustainable policy, planning, and other community-level action. We aspire to solve grand challenges facing society, including climate change, inequality, and justice.

Director, Dietrich Earnhart, Professor of Economics

The Center for Environmental Policy (CEP) draws upon interdisciplinary expertise to explore environmental policies, along with related protection efforts, and their impacts on society and nature. Center-sponsored research projects focus on the human decisions behind the formation and implementation of these policies and efforts, and, in turn, their impacts on the environment and related decisions.

Jay T. Johnson, Director, University Distinguished Professor of Geography & Atmospheric Science

The goal of  the Center for Indigenous Research, Science, and Technology  is to bridge Indigenous and Western sciences, through appropriate principles, protocols, and practices, in order to better understand the conditions of place-based vulnerability and the best strategies to achieve resilience by facilitating Indigenous-led research initiatives. Our vision is to establish an Indigenous science network that emphasizes research activities that contain integrated theory, practice and dissemination through mentoring and community-based partnerships.

Beth Bailey, Director, Foundation Distinguished Professor, History

 The Center for Military, War, and Society Studies  facilitates essential conversations about – and with – the U.S. military, holding national or international symposia that bring together scholars, policy makers, and members of the armed forces. We foster research on the US military on the KU campus and beyond, supporting scholarship that examines the military not only as an instrument of national defense but also as a central institution in American society.

Director, Argun Saatcioglu, Professor of Sociology

 CREW  aims to advance knowledge about technology’s effects on education and work, and to promote equity-focused policies and practices that foster social and economic wellbeing for all. We produce and support research on changes occurring in schools, communities, occupations, and workplaces in a technology-infused society. We seek to inform decision makers and the public at large about ways of maximizing collective benefits of technological change and preventing its potential harm.

CREW’s research addresses effective rural education, occupational readiness in response to AI-driven automation, and charter school effects on racial achievement gaps. CREW seeks to provide a platform for productive exchange of ideas on technology, education, and work. We value free, creative, and interdisciplinary exchange of ideas.

 CSTEP  research focuses on science policy, scientific labor markets, education policy, state and local economic development, and economic policy.

CSTEP staff lead the evaluation of the  Chan Zuckerberg Initiative Science Diversity Leadership Award . In partnership with the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine, CZI funds biomedical researchers who promote diversity, equity, and inclusion in their fields. The evaluation of this program includes wide-ranging data collection including surveys of applicants, program reviewers, and awardees; interviews with awardees, applicants, and mentees of awardees; and bibliometric analysis.  

Building on the work done for the Governor’s Tax Council, Ginther and Patricia Oslund created a series of synthetic taxpayers to model the effects of changes to Kansas tax codes on individuals and households. Oslund’s work shows the impact of new credits and existing child-related credits for families at different income levels. Their work also included an analysis of Governor Laura Kelly’s tax plan and a compared it to a competing plan. Ginther testified before the Senate Tax Committee on Senate Bill 377 about the Governor’s proposal and House Bill 2284 about the proposed flat tax on February 1-2, 2024.

With funding from the US Department of Education via the Kansas Board of Regents, this project team reported to the Kansas Board of Regents on the intersection of the workforce and education in Kansas and neighboring states. The team assessed the state’s post-secondary graduate retention rate and provided a series of 10-year projections of regional labor demand and degree requirements to the Kansas Board of Regents. One of the project’s goals was to gauge what KBOR universities will need to change to meet projected workforce requirements in 2030.

Ginther, Oslund, and Carlos Zambrana are working with the American Society of Microbiology to explore the labor market in microbiology and to understand how the industry has changed over time. Their research maps out career paths for microbiologists, documents the demand for scientific skills, and assesses the international breadth of microbial science. The number of microbiology doctorates is growing rapidly, and career opportunities in industry (compared to academia and government) have expanded.

 The Center for the Study of Injustice  is an interdisciplinary research center that brings together faculty and students from across KU interested in domestic and international research related to social justice. CSI assists faculty by developing research programs through grant writing and intellectual exchange, and brings KU faculty and students together who are interested in researching social justice. CSI collaborates with scholars in social sciences, journalism, law, public policy, and public health who address labor exploitation, migration, health inequalities, sexual violence and other vulnerabilities. CSI fosters the research capacity of graduate students and faculty by supporting scholarship and maintaining effectiveness in qualitative research.

The Center for the Study of Injustice convened a meeting of faculty conducting qualitative research to discuss creation of a qualitative methods graduate certificate, qualitative database management tools, and teaching and research collaboration

The School of Education and IPSR’s Qualitative Research Working Group hosted Rachel Schwaller, Department of History, for Qual Talks in February 2024. Schwaller shared her archival and oral history project of encamped groups in Lawrence, Kansas throughout history, and the group discussed ideas, connections, ethics, and research methods.

Laura Dean, associate professor of political science at Millikin University and director of the Human Trafficking Research Lab at Millikin, is part of a research team with NSF funding to collect time-sensitive data on online trafficking recruitment and response in Ukraine. Dean graduated from KU with doctorate in political science in 2014, and she was a formative part of the  Center for the Study of Injustice's  Anti-Slavery and Human Trafficking Initiative.  Read more. 

Corinne Schwarz released  Policing Victimhood: Human Trafficking, Frontline Work, and the Carceral State  about the policies intended to address trafficking and exploitation. Schwarz graduated from KU in 2018 with a doctoral degree with honors in Women, Gender, and Sexuality Studies. She worked on the Anti-Slavery and Human Trafficking Initiative and is an IPSR Doctoral Research Fellow.

Misty Heggeness, Associate Professor of Public Affairs & Administration and Research Scientist, IPSR, and Jarron Saint Onge, Professor of Population Health and Sociology, Co-directors

 The Kansas Population Center (KPC)  was established in October 2022 by founders Misty L. Heggeness and Jarron Saint Onge. Its focus is to consolidate population studies research on the Midwest and build a nationally renowned research and training center for all things demography in the middle of the country. The KPC was awarded $2.2 million in funding during the 2024 fiscal year to study women's health in rural communities, developed a dashboard of statistics on the care economy, and built a research portfolio on the impact of care gaps within a diverse set of industries.

The KPC launched a virtual seminar series in the fall 2023, which met regularly throughout the academic year and had a total of 8 speakers and 81 attendees. KPC affiliates have also participated in demographic methods training workshops at KU. The KPC has supported several students participating and presenting in national population meetings including the Population Association of America and the Southern Demographic Association annual research meetings. The KPC is excited to continue growing and contributing to the KU research and academic community by building out its program on population dynamics.

 All sessions and slides from the 2023 Kansas Economic Policy Conference  are posted online.

The IPSR Doctoral Research Fellows Program helps to develop the next generation of interdisciplinary social science scholars by providing training and support. Over the course of an academic year, fellows meet to discuss research progress and experiences, gain skills in interdisciplinary research methods, and present their research at the program’s conclusion.

For the 2023-24 cohort, we received many nominations across a wide variety of disciplines. A dynamic group of scholars was selected after careful review by the previous cohort of fellows. Over the course of the year, fellows met with faculty advisor Jay T. Johnson, professor of geography and atmospheric science and director of the Center for Indigenous Science, Research, and Technology, and a series of guest speakers. Fellows learned about a range of topics including grant funding, academic and non-academic hiring, policy-relevant research, and data storytelling. The 2023-2024 IPSR Doctoral Research Fellows program concluded with a showcase of research presentations from the fellows at the Burge Union.

Jennifer Babitzke, Sociology, “Contemporary Fathering in Middle America”

Noelle Broughton, Public Affairs & Administration, “Municipal Tax Sale: Race, Profit, and Urban Renewal”

Mohsen Fatemi, Public Affairs & Administration, “Local Transformative Capacity and Policy Innovation”

Senjuti Mallik, Geography & Atmospheric Science, “COVID-19 Transmission Paths and Treatment-Seeking Behavior among Slum Residents in Kolkata, India”

Sreerupa Sanyal, Communication Studies, “Investigating Reinforcing Spirals in Incidental Exposure to Political News and News Engagement on Social Media Applications”

Heeyoun Shin, Sociology, “How Do Children Self-locate Themselves in the Social Hierarchy? Educationally Homogamous Parents, Working Mothers, and Children’s Subjective Social Status”

Tatsuya Suzuki, Communication Studies, “Theorizing Sanctions in Networked Counterpublics. A study of #StopAsianHate”

Christabel Tsoto, Geography & Atmospheric Science, “The Effects of Parental Migration on the Well-Being of Children Left Behind in Zimbabwe”

Marie Wagner, Special Education, “Perpetuating Neoliberal Pathologies: What Teacher Candidates Believe Students with Disabilities Should Learn”

Derek Wilson, Sociology, “Smart Home’s Meaning in Later Life: How Older Adults Make Meaning of Smart Home Technology in their Lives”

Yiwen Wu, Public Affairs & Administration, “Refining Hazard Mitigation Planning: Assessing Government Outsourcing’s Influence on Local Plan Quality”

This year, IPSR published a  new data dashboard  showing the flow of federal funding from the Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security (CARES) Act and the American Rescue Plan Act (ARPA) into Kansas. As of March 2024, over $11.5 billion has been expended across the state through programs funded by the CARES Act and ARPA. 

This tool offers a transparent look at the funding released through these programs, and the dashboard can help users understand how that funding has affected different parts of Kansas. The dashboard shows funds received by county, by fund and by spending categories such as child care, education and economic revitalization.

Users can filter spending data by funding program, including both CARES Act and ARPA programs. Expenditures include $7.38 billion in Payroll Protection Program (PPP) loans under the CARES Act, which accounts for about 64% of total Kansas federal expenditures to date. As of September 2023, 99% of PPP loans in Kansas had been forgiven.   

Users can also look at county totals and spending per capita alongside statewide figures. State and local governments have until Dec. 31, 2026, to spend funds awarded by ARPA. Most CARES Act spending was concluded by the end of 2022. The dashboard will be updated as spending reports are submitted to the federal government.  

Xan Wedel, Daria Milakhina, Thomas Becker, and Donna Ginther worked on this project with external collaborators. The Kansas Office of Recovery funded this work.

This year, IPSR welcomed seven new staff members:

• Nellie Kassebaum, Research Development Specialist
• Lucie Prewitt, Associate Researcher, The Care Board
• Anna Radcliffe, Research Project Specialist, The Care Board
• Natalie Parker, Program Manager, Center for Indigenous Research, Science, and Technology
• Joseph Bommarito, Research Engineer, The Care Board
• Benjy Jacobs, Kansas Water Dashboard
• Caty Movich, Administrative Associate Senior

IPSR Associate Director Jena Gunter celebrated 10 years of service to KU, and Senior Research Engineer Xan Wedel celebrated 25 years of service

IPSR’s success is built on the engagement and contributions of our affiliates, center directors, and staff. In the coming year, we look forward to continuing the work of advancing social science and policy-relevant research at the University of Kansas and beyond. Join us!