Debra Hevenstone

CV

Working Papers

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 pdf version of CV

 

Education

2003-2008

Joint Ph.D. in Sociology and Public Policy and certificate in Complex Systems (3.8/4.0)

University of Michigan

2000-2001

M.A. in Social Science (3.8/4.0)

University of Chicago

1994-2000

B.A. in Social Science (3.7/4.0)

Bard College

Career History

Jan 2009

Present

Research Fellow, Policy Studies Institute, London

Worked on statistical analyses using large government data sets to conduct a cost benefit analysis of active labour market programs and conducted interviews for a qualitative study of a UK disability program. Initiated a project comparing international labour market institutions and their effects as well as a project studying tax devolution and federalism.

Jan 2007

Jan 2009

Visiting Researcher/Post-doc, ETH Zurich

Completed dissertation, presented research to brown bags in Sociology and Economics, edited and translated articles, taught Social Stratification, and conducted statistical analyses for the research group.

Jan 2008

Jun 2008

Visiting Collaborator, International Labour Organization, Geneva

Conducted an international comparative analysis of the causes of atypical employment, its consequences, and proposed policy solutions.

Sep 2006

Jan 2009

Editorial Assistant, Journal of Sociological Methodology

Read manuscripts, suggested reviewers, and wrote reviews.

Sep 2004

Apr 2005

Research Assistant, University of Michigan

Conducted geostatistical analyses related to racial inequalities in birth outcomes for the Roadmap to Health Disparities project.

Sep 2000

Aug 2003

Senior Research Analyst, Brookings Institution, Washington D.C.

Worked on the Welfare Reform and Beyond project, researching the devolution of American social policy and its effects.

Nov 1999

Jun 2000

Research Assistant, University of Chicago

Translated and transcribed teacher and student interviews in Spanish and English for the Students and Standards Project and observed classrooms for an evaluation of the Adaptive Environments Learning Model.

Aug 1998  Sep 1999

Case Manager, Big Brothers Big Sisters of King County, Seattle

Counselled 40 mentoring relationships. Developed, budgeted, and implemented a volunteer training program, and temporarily managed activities.

Dec 1998

May 1999

Recruitment Manager, Denise Louie Head Start, Seattle

Managed recruitment budget and program. Developed community partnerships. Managed a bilingual (Spanish/English) caseload of 36 families.


 

Teaching

Social Stratification, ETH Zurich

Developed and taught a seminar on social stratification as guest lecturer. Course included methodological units on measuring inequality, poverty, and segregation, and substantive units on inequality, poverty, migration, and discrimination.

Introductory Statistics, Department of Sociology, University of Michigan

Taught biweekly sections of 10 PhD students. The course began with normal distributions and ended with OLS regression and ANOVA. Sections included reviewing homework, learning Stata, and going through class materials.

Introductory Statistics, Department of Sociology, University of Michigan

Taught biweekly sections of 20 undergraduate students. The course began with means and ended with ANOVA. Sections included reviewing homework and learning how to use SPSS.

Geostatistics, School of Civil and Environmental Engineering, University of Michigan

Helped students with homework and graded homework and tests. Material covered included: kriging, anistropy, and inverse modelling. Homework used primarily Matlab, but also some Arcview GIS.
 

Publications

Hevenstone, Debra. 2009. "National Context and Atypical Employment" International

Sociology 24.

 

Hevenstone, Debra. 2008. "Employment Intermediaries: A model of firm incentives" Journal of Mathematical Sociology 33:1-37.

 

Hevenstone, Debra. 2008. "Academic Employment Networks & Departmental Prestige" in Why Context Matters: Applications of Social Network Analysis, edited by Thomas Friemel. Wiesbaden : VS-Verlag.

 

Hevenstone, Debra. 2008. "Labour Market Inequality and Atypical Employment" Doctoral Dissertation, University of Michigan.

 

Hevenstone, Debra and Kent Weaver. February 22, 2002. “Neediest Families in Texas Deserve a Fairer Deal” op-ed Houston Chronicle.

Hevenstone, Debra. 2001. "Testing Variation in Welfare Reform" Anthropology News 42.

 

Hevenstone, Debra. 2000. "Overcoming Obstacles to Employment: Variation in Support Services among Welfare to Work Grantees" Master’s Thesis, University of Chicago.

 

In Progress

"European Labour Institutions and the Fixed Term Wage Gap" (Revised draft submitted to AJS)

"Mandated Labour Protections and Government Safety Nets: Economic Outcomes and Worker Security" (initial draft)

"The Consequences of Migration and Voting for the Management of Tax Decentralization" (submitted grant proposal)


 

Presentations

"Mandated Labour Protections and Government Safety Nets: Economic outcomes and worker security'' International Labour Organisation, Regulating Decent Work Conference. July 8, 2009.

 

"The Causes and Consequences of Atypical Employment" The University of Westminster,

Policy Studies Institute. November 6, 2008. (invited)

 

"The Fixed-Term Contract Wage Gap: An analysis of ten European countries " International

Sociology Association, Committee on Social Stratification. May 15, 2008.

 

"Taxation and Public Goods Under Federalism: Exit, voice, and federal redistribution" Department of Economics Tartu University. May 6, 2008. (invited)

 

"National Context and Atypical Employment" Population Association of America Annual

Meeting. April 2008. (poster)

 

"Academic Employment Networks: Centrality in employment" European Conference on Complex Systems, Technische Universitat Dresden. October 2007.

 

"Academic Employment Networks: Hiring and prestige" Applications of Social Network Analysis, University of Zurich. September 2007.

 

"Technological Change, On-Site Outsourcing, and its Consequences for Stratification"

Population Association of America. March 2007.

 

"On-Site Outsourcing: Spatial diffusion and earnings Differentials" American Sociological

Association. August 2006.

 

"Employer-Employee Matching with Intermediary Parties" International Conference on Complex Systems. June 2006.
 

Awards

University of Michigan Debt Management Award, 2007

A prize for PhD candidates nominated by their departments who show academic merit and a commitment to public service ($10,000).

 

Rackham Research Grant, 2007

An award for dissertation fieldwork ($3,000).

 

IDEAS/IGERT Fellowship, 2006-08

National Science Foundation funded fellowship for doctoral research in Complex

Systems ($60,000 stipend plus tuition and fees).

 

Earl & Esther Johnson Prize, 2000

A prize from the University of Chicago's Masters of Arts Program in the Social Sciences for the best Master's thesis ($1,000).

 

Service

Co-chair: Complex Systems Advanced Academic Workshop, University of Michigan, 2006-07

Reviewer: European Sociological Review, Sociological Methodology, Journal of Criminal Justice

 

Skills

Language

§         English: Mother tongue

  • Spanish: Excellent passive but less active knowledge.

§         German: Good verbal skills, very good reading comprehension, beginner writing skills.

Tools/Programming

§         Statistics: STATA, R, SAS, SPSS, Matlab

§         Network Analysis: Pajek, Guess

§         Office: LaTeX, Microsoft Office, Illustrator

§         GIS: Arcview, GeoDa

§         Java programming with Repast

§         Worked in Windows and Linux environments

Additional Qualifications

2007-2009

ETH Zurich – Courses in German

2004/2005

ICPSR, Michigan – Summer courses in Geostatistics and Bayesian Statistics

1997

Universidad Nacional de Cordoba, Argentina – Courses in Social Science and Spanish

1995

Instituto Cultural Oaxaca, Mexico – Spanish language immersion

 

Professional Affiliations

Population Association of America

American Sociological Association

International Sociological Association, RC 28