Andrew Penner, UCI sociology professor, has been elected to the Sociological Research Association. The highly selective 400-person society of sociological scholars was founded in 1936 and annually elects up to 14 new members. The honor recognizes those selected as being the most successful researchers in their field.

Penner joined the UCI faculty in 2008 after earning a Ph.D. at UC Berkeley. The professor currently serves as founding director of the UCI Center for Administrative Data Analysis, and  affiliate researcher with UCI’s Center for Population, Inequality and Policy and Center for Organizational Research.

Penner’s research focuses broadly on questions around inequality in education and the labor market, seeking to understand how individuals are sorted into categories and the implications of these categories for their lives. Ongoing work involves collaborating with K-12 schools to link student data with local and national partners to create new data resources that can address policy relevant questions (e.g., the young adult outcomes associated with being suspended in high school). 

Funded by the National Science Foundation, the National Institutes of Health and the Spencer Foundation, among others, Penner’s work has appeared in top journals including Science, the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences and the American Journal of Sociology.