Community Action: A Source of Strength
Keynote Presenter: Kathryn Edin is one of the nation’s leading poverty researchers, working in the domains of welfare and low-wage work, family life, and neighborhood contexts. A qualitative and mixed-method researcher, she has taken on key mysteries about the urban poor that have not been fully answered by quantitative work: How do single mothers possibly survive on welfare? Why don’t more go to work? Why do they end up as single mothers in the first place? Where are the fathers and why do they disengage from their children’s lives?
How have the lives of the single mothers changed as a result of welfare reform? Edin has authored 8 books and some 80 journal articles. The hallmark of her research is her direct, in-depth observations of the lives of low-income women, men, and children.