Professor of Public Policy
School of Economic, Political, and Policy Sciences
University of Texas at Dallas
800 W. Campbell Road
GR31 Richardson, TX 75080-3021
jargo@utdallas.edu

Biography

Paul A. Jargowsky is Professor of Public Policy with the School of Economic, Political, and Policy Sciences at the University of Texas at Dallas. He is an affiliated scholar at the Urban Institute and an affiliated researcher with CALDER. His research interests include residential segregation by race and class, neighborhood and school effects on student achievement, minority access to higher education, and educational attainment and economic mobility.

Dr. Jargowsky is well known for his work on high-poverty neighborhoods in U.S. metropolitan areas.  His book, Poverty and Place: Ghettos, Barrios, and the American City, was named the Best Book in Urban Affairs for 1997-1998 by the Urban Affairs Association.  His work helped to refocus the debate about high poverty neighborhoods in the inner city away from local neighborhood factors and toward the metropolitan housing and labor markets that contribute to economic segregation. 

Dr. Jargowsky was formerly the Director and is now a member of the Executive Committee of the Texas Schools Project, which brings together data from multiple Texas state agencies, school districts, as well as other sources to support independent, high-quality academic research on a variety of topics.  Using TSP data, Jargowsky has investigated the impact of the Texas Top Ten Percent plan on minority enrollment in higher education and neighborhood and peer affects on student achievement.  He received his Ph.D. in Public Policy (1991) from Harvard University.