Walter Allen, Distinguished Professor of Education, Sociology and African American Studies, is the 2016 recipient of the Scholar of Color Distinguished Career Contribution Award from the American Educational Research Association. The award recognizes scholars who have made significant contributions to understanding the issues that disproportionately affect minority populations.
Allen is the UCLA Allan Murray Cartter Professor of Higher Education, a role in which he established and directs the Choices Project, a longitudinal research study of college access and equity for African Americans and Latinos in California. More broadly, the study examines how social inequality limits life choices and life chances in education, family, work, health and the environment.
Allen is also co-investigator for Educational Diversity in U.S. Law Schools, a national, longitudinal study of race, ethnicity, teaching and learning at 70 law schools among 8,000 law students. He collaborates on two international studies, Preserving Biodiversity in Central Africa, a study of tropical forest conservation schemes, public education and community support; and Social Inclusion and the Quality of Higher Education in Post- Conflict Colombia, a study of access, equity and quality in Colombia’s higher education system.
Allen has served as an expert witness in affirmative action and higher education discrimination cases before the U.S. Supreme Court. He has also testified on race, education and inequality before the U.N. in Geneva, Switzerland, and the U. S. House of Representatives. Allen frequently serves as a commentator in the media, including “The MacNeil-Lehrer Report,” the New York Times and the Wall Street Journal. He served as an adviser to and will appear in the upcoming Firelight Films documentary, “Tell Them We Are Rising: The Story of Historically Black Colleges and Universities.”
