ICPSR Announces Recipients of the 2023 Flanigan, Miller, and Simmons Awards
ANN ARBOR–ICPSR is excited to announce the recipients of the 2023 ICPSR Awards, which recognize individuals who have distinguished themselves in their service to the social science community. This year’s awardees are celebrated for their mentorship, research, data advocacy, and more.
William H. Flanigan Award for Distinguished Service as an ICPSR Official Representative
The Flanigan Award recipient for 2023, James A. Jacobs, is a Data Services Librarian Emeritus, from the University of California, San Diego. He has been an inspiration, visionary, and mentor to a generation of data services and government information librarians for over 35 years. Jacobs was an early innovator who designed and built web-based tools to search and access data online. In 1990, he co-created and began teaching the ICPSR Summer Program Workshop, “Providing Social Science Data Services: Strategies for Design and Operation” with Chuck Humphries (Flanigan Award, 2005) and Diane Geraci (Flanigan Award, 2009), a team known as “The Three Data Amigos.” Since its inception, this one-week course has rigorously grounded and trained hundreds of librarians, academic staff, and computing specialists in the fundamentals of offering social science data services at their institutions. Course participants have gone on to serve (and lead) our data profession, as well as the broader library field. “When the three of us were asked to teach the ICPSR Summer Workshop for 2014, Jim was extremely supportive and generous with his knowledge and experience as we approached the daunting task of standing on the shoulders of giants,” said Bobray Bordelon, Jane Fry, and Ron Nakao. Jacobs is one of the co-founders of Free Government Information (FGI), which informs, organizes, and advocates for the preservation and perpetual free access to government information. He has served on the Administrative Committee of IASSIST (International Association for Social Science Services and Technology), and continues to research, write, and consult on government information and providing data services. A selection of his publications includes "Beyond LMGTFY: Access to Government Information in a Networked World," with James R. Jacobs in Public Knowledge: Access and Benefits, Edited by Miriam A. Drake and Donald T. Hawkins 2016; Data Basics: An Introductory Text, with Diane Geraci and Chuck Humphrey, 2012; "Born-Digital U.S. Federal Government Information: Preservation and Access" (2014 Report prepared for the Center for Research Libraries); and "Preserving research data" with Charles Humphrey (Communications of the ACM, 2004). Jacobs received his bachelor’s degree from Oberlin College and his MSLS from the University of Southern California.
Warren E. Miller Award for Meritorious Service to the Social Sciences
The Miller Award recipient for 2023, Katharine G. Abraham is a Distinguished University Professor at the University of Maryland. Her published research includes papers on the work and retirement decisions of older Americans; how government policies affect employers’ choices concerning employment and hours over the business cycle; the effects of financial aid on the decision to attend college; discrepancies in alternative measures of employment, wages and hours; and the measurement of economic activity. Abraham served as Commissioner of the Bureau of Labor Statistics from 1993 through 2001 and as a Member of the President’s Council of Economic Advisers from 2011 through 2013. She currently serves on standing academic advisory committees convened by the Congressional Budget Office, Bureau of Economic Analysis, and Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago. Abraham is a Research Associate of the National Bureau of Economic Research and a Research Fellow of the IZA, a member of the National Academy of Sciences and of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, a Distinguished Fellow of the American Economic Association, and an elected Fellow of the American Statistical Association and of the Society of Labor Economists. She received her PhD in economics from Harvard University in 1982 and her BS in economics from Iowa State University in 1976.
Piper A. Simmons Award for Social and Behavioral Research Data Contributions
The Simmons Award recipient for 2023 is the Survey of Consumer Attitudes and Behavior (also known as the Surveys of Consumers), led by Director and Chief Economist Joanne W. Hsu. The Surveys of Consumers were initiated in the late 1940s by the Survey Research Center at the University of Michigan Institute for Social Research, under the direction of George Katona. These surveys have been carried out quarterly until 1977, and monthly from 1978 onward.
The surveys use a national sample of dwelling units selected by area probability sampling that is representative of the adult population of the United States. The purpose of these surveys is to measure changes in consumer attitudes and expectations, to understand why these changes occur, to evaluate how they relate to consumer decisions to save, borrow, or make discretionary purchases, and to forecast changes in aggregate consumer behavior.
What’s next?
The 2023 ICPSR Awards will be presented on Thursday, Oct. 5, 2023, at the awards banquet during the 2023 ICPSR Biennial Meeting.
Contact: Dory Knight-Ingram
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Sep 13, 2023