Evelyn Patterson, assistant professor of sociology, is a recipient of a 2013-2014 Woodrow Wilson Foundation Career Enhancement Fellowship for Junior Faculty.
Twenty awards are given annually to junior professors in the humanities, social sciences and physical sciences whose scholarship focuses on the elimination of racial disparities. The fellowship award includes a retreat, mentorship, a grant for research, publication or travel, and support for a one-year sabbatical. Patterson’s fellowship mentor is Katharine Donato, chair of the sociology department.
Patterson studies the sociological impact of incarceration. Most recently, she examined the effect of prison on lifespan and found that each year spent in prison results in a two-year decline in life expectancy.
Patterson will use her sabbatical to work on a monograph on the demography of incarceration and several other research projects on health disparities, the school-to-prison pipeline and the impact of the mass incarceration on social and health outcomes.