Leadership

Judith M. Gueron, Ph.D.
Scholar in Residence
MDRC
New York City

Judith M. Gueron is a Scholar in Residence and President Emerita at MDRC, a nonprofit, nonpartisan social policy research organization. Dr. Gueron joined MDRC (formerly called the Manpower Demonstration Research Corporation) as research director at its founding in 1974 and served as its president from 1986 through August 2004. Under her leadership, MDRC became one of America’s most prominent policy research organizations, with a mission to design and evaluate education, employment, and social welfare programs aimed at improving the well-being of low-income Americans and to enhance the effectiveness of policy and practice.

At MDRC, Dr. Gueron directed many of the largest federal and state evaluations ever undertaken of interventions for low-income adults, youth, and families and was a pioneer in developing research methods that have made it possible to base social programs on rigorous evidence of effectiveness. As president, she also guided the organization’s expansion into such areas as supports for the working poor, education reforms, child development, and community-based initiatives.

A widely published, nationally recognized expert on employment and training, poverty, and family assistance, Dr. Gueron is the author of From Welfare to Work. She is past president of the Association for Public Policy Analysis and Management, has served on several National Academy of Sciences committees and federal advisory panels, and has frequently testified before Congress. In 1988, Dr. Gueron was awarded the American Evaluation Association’s Myrdal Prize for Evaluation Practice in recognition of high-quality studies of employment issues. That same year, she became a member of the Board of Directors of Alcoa and is currently also on the Board of Directors of the National Bureau of Economic Research. In 2004-05, Dr. Gueron was a Visiting Scholar at the Russell Sage Foundation. In 2005, she received the inaugural Richard E. Neustadt award from the John F. Kennedy School of Government, Harvard University.

Dr. Gueron received her B.A. Summa Cum Laude from Radcliffe College in 1963 and her Ph.D. in economics from Harvard University in 1971. She and her husband, Henri, live in New York City. They have two daughters.

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