Craig Carpenter, an assistant professor in the Michigan State University Department of Agricultural, Food and Resource Economics, has been given the 2024 Geoffrey J.D. Hewings Award by the North American Regional Science Council.
NARSC is an international scholarly organization that includes institutional members and covers a wide range of disciplines such as economics, geography, finance, public policy, urban planning and more.
The award, which is presented once each year, recognizes distinguished contributions to regional science research by a scientist in the first 10 years after receiving a doctoral degree. Carpenter is the second MSU researcher to win the award, which began in 1995. It was presented to him Nov. 15 in New Orleans at the 71st Annual North American Meetings of the Regional Science Association International.
“This award is one of the most prestigious honors for an early career scientist and economist, so I’m extremely humbled by this recognition,” Carpenter said. “I appreciate NARSC and my colleagues across the state, country and internationally. I’ve been fortunate to work with great teams looking to make tangible, community-based impacts that help as many people as possible, especially vulnerable populations.”
NARSC acknowledged Carpenter’s expertise and innovation in regional economic modeling, minority entrepreneurship and public policy research. Of particular importance to the award selection committee was his history of robust funding — nearly $4 million — from the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s (USDA) National Institute of Food and Agriculture (NIFA), the USDA Foreign Agricultural Service, and the National Science Foundation, among others.
Carpenter, whose position at MSU is supported in part by MSU AgBioResearch and MSU Extension, performs research on community and economic development. He primarily focuses on questions related to race, ethnicity, veteran status, entrepreneurship, economic growth and public policy.
He has published 30 peer-reviewed articles and policy publications in journals such as Economic Development Quarterly and the Journal of Regional Science. This is in addition to 75 outreach and extension publications and more than 50 presentations at outreach meetings.
Carpenter has led the creation of several outreach resources, including a website through MSU Extension that details the history of redlining and other racially driven housing policies.
Also in November, Carpenter was presented with the 2024 National Extension Diversity Award by the Association of Public and Land-Grant Universities and USDA NIFA as part of an MSU Extension team. The group was honored for their innovative work in housing policy education.
This story originally appeared on the AgBioResearch website.
