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University of Rochester Provost David Figlio

Meet the Provost

David Figlio is the University of Rochester’s provost and chief academic officer

On this page, you’ll learn more about provost David Figlio and his current initiatives, as well as discover our rich history of past provosts.

University of Rochester provost David Figlio

David Figlio is the University of Rochester’s Provost and Gordon Fyfe Professor of Economics and Education. He began his role at the University effective July 1, 2022. Read the full news announcement.

Figlio is an internationally recognized economist and educational leader whose interdisciplinary research spans educational, public, and social policy, including the link between health and education.

 

meet with david figlio

Provost’s office hours

Provost Figlio holds regular office hours as opportunities to meet with members of the University community. Use our Outlook form to sign up for one of these informal meetings. Contact us if you need assistance or have difficulty accessing the form.

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More about David Figlio

David Figlio conducts research on a wide range of education and health policy issues from school accountability and standards to welfare policy and policy design, as well as the interrelationship between education and health. He also studies aspects of the academic profession itself, with recent papers on academic peer review and the publication process. He collaborates frequently with state and local health and education agencies, and recently led a National Science Foundation-sponsored national network to facilitate the use of matched administrative datasets to inform and evaluate education policy. He was elected to the National Academy of Education in 2017.

Figlio has published his work in numerous leading journals, including the American Economic ReviewProceedings of the National Academy of SciencesJAMA PediatricsReview of Economics and StatisticsAmerican Economic Journal: Applied EconomicsAmerican Economic Journal: Economic Policy, and Journal of Human Resources. Organizations supporting his research include the National Science Foundation, National Institute of Child Health and Human Development, and the U.S. Departments of Agriculture, Education, and Health and Human Services, as well as the Annie E. Casey, Doris Duke Charitable Trust, Gates, Laura and John Arnold, MacArthur, Smith Richardson, and Spencer foundations, among others.

Figlio is a research associate at the National Bureau of Economic Research; a research fellow of the IZA Institute of Labor Economics in Bonn, Germany; a member of the CESifo Network on the Economics of Education in Munich, Germany; and an affiliate of the Institute for Research on Poverty at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.

He served as the inaugural editor of the Association for Education Finance and Policy’s journal, Education Finance and Policy (MIT Press), and recently completed ten years as Coeditor and then Editor (from 2015-2021) of the Journal of Human Resources. He has been part of numerous national education task forces and panels, such as the Institute of Medicine’s panel on the Science of Child Development from Birth through Age Eight, and advised several U.S. states and foreign nations on the design, implementation, and evaluation of educational policies.

Figlio joined Rochester on July 1, 2022 from Northwestern University, where he served as Orrington Lunt Professor and Dean of the School of Education and Social Policy, and was previously the Director of Northwestern’s Institute for Policy Research. Prior to that he taught at the University of Oregon and the University of Florida, where he was the Knight-Ridder Professor of Economics. He earned his PhD in 1995 from the University of Wisconsin-Madison.

Figlio’s recent publications

Past provosts

Sarah Peyre headshot

Sarah Peyre

2021–2022

Robert Clark speaking at Commencement

Robert Clark

2016–2021

Peter Lennie headshot

Peter Lennie

2012–2016

Ralph Kuncl headshot cropped

Ralph Kuncl

2007–2012

Charles Phelps headshot cropped

Charles E. Phelps

1994–2007

Brian J. Thompson headshot cropped

Brian J. Thompson

1984–1994

Richard O'Brien headshot cropped

Richard D. O’Brien

1978–1984

Richard Sproull headshot cropped

Robert L. Sproull

1968–1970

McCrea Hazlett headshot

McCrea Hazlett

1961–1968

Howard Anderson headshot

Howard R. Anderson

1960–1961

Donald Gilbert headshot

Donald Gilbert

1948–1951

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