Wei LAB Founder
Jerlando F. L. Jackson is the Vilas Distinguished Professor of Higher Education and the Director and Chief Research Scientist of Wisconsin’s Equity and Inclusion Laboratory (Wei LAB) at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. As Director of the Wei LAB, he is responsible for managing the Innovation Incubator (I2), National Study of Intercollegiate Athletics (NSIA), and the International Colloquium on Black Males in Education. Dr. Jackson is working to advance the Wei LAB’s Translational and Commercialization Division, which fosters new education products and ventures based on the LAB’s scientific and intellectual property assets. Prior to establishing the Wei LAB in 2010, he served as founding Executive Director for the Center for African American Research and Policy (CAARP), which is a nonpartisan, independent, nonprofit research organization. CAARP was founded in 2005 as part of his faculty work and professional service obligations, and was spun-out in 2007 as a 501(c) (3).
His central research interest is organizational science in higher education, with a special interest in hiring practices, career mobility, workforce diversity, and workplace discrimination. He also has a portfolio of research focused on interventions designed to broaden participation for underrepresented groups in the scientific workforce. He is credited with over 100 publications that appear in high-impact journals that include Research in Higher Education, IEEE Computer, American Behavioral Scientist, Teachers College Record, Review of Higher Education, and West’s Educational Law Reporter. His books include Measuring Glass Ceiling Effects: Opportunities and Challenges for Jossey Bass (2014), Introduction to American Higher Education for Routledge (2010), Ethnic and Racial Administrative Diversity: Understanding Work Life Realities and Experiences in Higher Education for Jossey Bass (2009); Strengthening the African American Educational Pipeline: Informing Research, Policy, and Practice for SUNY-Albany Press (2007); and Toward Administrative Reawakening: Creating and Maintaining Safe College Campuses for Stylus Publishing (2007). Dr. Jackson has delivered over 200 research papers and keynote addresses globally.
Actively involved in professional associations, and civic and community based-groups, he has received numerous honors for this work. His recent awards include the 2014 Brown Award for Excellence in Higher Education and Community Service (Charles Hamilton Houston Institute, 2012 Outstanding Young Professional (Iowa State University), 2012 Carlos J. Vallejo Memorial Award for Exemplary Scholarship (American Educational Research Association), and 2011 Distinguished Scholar Award (Committee on Scholars of Color, American Educational Research Association). Dr. Jackson holds a B. E. in Music Education (University of Southern Mississippi), M. Ed. in Higher Education Administration (Auburn University), C.P.M (Iowa State University), and Ph.D. in Higher Education (Iowa State University).