The Center for Human Potential and Public Policy

The well-being of children and their families is the focus of the Center for Human Potential and Public Policy. The center facilitates multidisciplinary research, promotes informed policy discussion, and encourages academic training in poverty and social inequality, child and family policy, education and job training, and other related fields.

The center’s training and research are guided by three objectives: to generate high-caliber research on social policy geared toward families and children, to train a new generation of leaders in child and family policy and research, and to foster communication between policy professionals and researchers.

Within these areas, the center’s research spans a wide range, including child cognitive and emotional development, school-readiness, teenage parenthood, parental incarceration, family structure, and poverty. Recent research has examined the transitions to adulthood for adolescent mothers; school-readiness and children’s emotional development; emotional and physical growth of children of drug-abusing mothers; welfare reform and the multiple roles of low-income women; incarcerated mothers; and health insurance and children’s health.

Research findings are shared in the intellectually challenging and enriching environment of the “Conversations” workshop series. Guest speakers present current research and discuss its policy implications. Attendees include faculty and students, as well as Chicago-area researchers, funders, and community activists. Recent workshops have featured “Do Generous Welfare Policies Benefit Children in Single-Parent Families?” (Rachel Dunifon, Cornell University), “The Controversy Over Corporal Punishment: Common Sense, Common Science, and the Role of Public Policy” (Elizabeth Gershoff, National Center for Children in Poverty, Columbia University), and “The Long-Term and Dynamic Consequences of Divorce For Children” (Donna Morrison, Georgetown University).

The center provides merit-based scholarship and training opportunities to masters and doctoral students committed to studying child and family well-being. Training is accomplished through programs at the Harris School and other departments and schools within the university.

CHPPP is directed by C. Cybele Raver, associate professor in the Harris School and a developmental psychologist by training.