In 2025, IPR’s researchers examined some of the most pressing social issues, including the real-world implications of artificial intelligence and the persistent racial disparities in maternal health.
IPR research continued to inform policy nationally and locally, contributing evidence to debates on young-adult sentencing reform and wage theft among fast-food workers. Our faculty’s work also helped guide global conversations about water insecurity and highlighted the effectiveness of community-based strategies to reduce gun violence in Chicago.
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Policymakers need to share data summaries—census results, for example—with the public without exposing any one individual’s personal information. But computer scientists have shown that it is possible to learn things about individuals from published summaries. One solution is differential privacy, which adds statistical noise that protects individuals. Drawing on a case study of the 2020 U.S. Census, Priyanka Nanayakkara (PhD 2024) and IPR computer scientist Jessica Hullman provide guidance for policymakers considering whether to use differential privacy.
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Chicago’s deadly 1995 heat wave showed how neighborhood conditions and social ties determine who stays safe in extreme weather. Now, IPR associate and climate change scholar Daniel Horton is leading a working group to map those risks through a Heat Vulnerability Index. Combining data like temperature, public health records, and residents’ on-the-ground insights, the index will pinpoint which Chicago communities face the greatest danger as climate change makes heat waves more common.
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This month’s new research from our faculty experts examines how state reproductive rights policies relate to preterm birth rates and which kinds of messages most effectively encouraged people to adopt COVID-19 precautions during the pandemic. It also looks at how policymakers can better judge whether a new policy will improve people's overall welfare and how researchers can strengthen the tools used to measure policy impacts over time.
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Faculty Insights
“Losing a fifth of your budget absolutely can have deleterious effects. To put that into perspective, you're talking about losing maybe $2,000, $2,500 per kid [in Chicago Public Schools]. Estimates show that that would reduce college going rates by about 6% or 7%.”
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Working Papers
Our bimonthly working paper newsletter highlights the newest additions from our faculty experts. You can sign up to receive notification of our newest working papers, or view all of our working papers on our website.
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