Sean Joe
Research Fellow
sjoe@wustl.edu
Sean Joe is the Benjamin E. Youngdahl Professor of Social Development and the founding and principal director of the Race and Opportunity Lab at Washington University in St. Louis’ school of social work. He is a past president of the Society for Social Work and Research and serves as a fellow of the American Academy of Social Work and Social Welfare, the Society for Social Work and Research, and the New York Academy of Medicine. He has also been an invited presenter for the Brookings Institution and the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis.
Joe leads HomeGrown StL, the Race and Opportunity Lab’s leading community science project, which is a multilevel, place-based community organizing intervention designed to enhance the economic mobility and health of Black youth and young men ages 12 to 35 in the St. Louis region.
His work investigates larger-scale policy experiments using data to examine wealth gaps and barriers to wealth-building opportunities for Black men, namely differences in labor market outcomes and other factors affecting economic conditions in low- and moderate-income communities.
Joe’s research has appeared in well-known, peer-reviewed journals including The Journal of the American Medical Association, Journal of Social Work and Social Welfare, and the Review of Research in Education.