Victoria defrancesco soto biography

American political scientist and academic administrator

Victoria Maria DeFrancesco Soto is an American political scientist and academic administrator. She is dean of the Clinton School of Public Service at the University of Arkansas. She was previously the assistant dean for civic engagement and a senior lecturer at the Lyndon B. Johnson School of Public Affairs.

She researches immigration, women and politics, political psychology, and campaigns and elections.

DeFrancesco Soto was born to Victoria and Joseph DeFrancesco in Southern Arizona. Her mother is from Sonora. She is of Italian, Jewish, and Mexican descent. She completed a bachelor's degree in political science and Latin American studies at the University of Arizona. She earned a master's and Ph.D. from the Graduate School of Duke University. Her 2007 dissertation was titled, Do Latinos Party All the Time? The Role of Shared Ethnic Group Identity on Political.John Aldrich was her doctoral advisor.

DeFrancesco Soto is the first Latina dean of the Clinton School of Public Service.

References

External links

Dr. Victoria M. DeFrancesco Soto received her Ph.D. from Duke University and was recently named one of the top 12 scholars in the country by Diverse magazine. Her research on political behavior has been widely published in scholarly journals and cited in the New York Times, Los Angeles Times, Chicago Tribune, Time, and POLITICO. Fluent in both English and Spanish, Victoria provides political analysis on both US politics and its implications forcountries abroad.

Victoria’s research analyzes how social identities shape political behavior. Her academic work focuses on: campaigns and elections, political marketing, race and ethnic politics, and immigration. She also serves on the editorial board of Politics,Groups, and Identities. She is currently working on a book manuscript that analyzes the role of inter-group identities and micro-targeting in political campaigns.

In the media sphere, Victoria contributes to various national and international media outlets. She is a regular political analyst for Univision and CNN en Espanol. In 2008 and 2010, she served as a primary expert and analyst for CNN en Espanol’s election coverage. Victoria also appears on MSNBC, FoxNews, NPR, and Sirius XM. In her media analysis Victoria is passionate about making social science relatable to real time political events. She is a regular blogger for POLITICO’S Arena, Huffington Post, and the Daily Grito.

Victoria is a Fellow at the Center for Governance and Politics at the LBJ School of Public Affairs at the University of Texas at Austin. She also serves as the Director of Communications for Latino Decisions and is a Senior Fellow at the Bernard Center for Women, Politics, and Public Policy.

Victoria is a proud native of Cochise County in Southern Arizona. She is of Italian-Jewish-Mexican heritage and lives in beautiful Austin, Texas.

Victoria DeFrancesco Soto is the Dean Designate of the Clinton School of Public Service at the University of Arkansas and currently serves as Assistant Dean at the LBJ School of Public Affairs and a political analyst for NBC News and Telemundo.

Victoria is the first Latina Dean at a presidential institution and she was named one of the top 12 scholars in the country by Diverse magazine. Victoria previously taught at Northwestern University and Rutgers and received her Ph.D. in political science from Duke University.

Her areas of expertise include civic engagement, women, immigration, Latinos and political psychology. Underlying all of her research interests is the applicability of high-quality, rigorous research to on-the-ground policy realities. Victoria has spent over two decades bridging academic, practitioner, community, and media realms in her quest to cultivate public service engagement across our national landscape.

In her role as inaugural Dean of Civic Engagement at the LBJ School Victoria created a Civic Engagement Program and oversaw the launch and management of the LBJ Women’s Campaign School. She also secured numerous external partnerships and university-wide collaborations.

An award-winning professor, Victoria is deeply passionate about the intersection of curricular and community-based learning and cultivating dynamic classroom environments that are responsive to our real-world context. Throughout her more than 20 years in a classroom, Victoria has designed and implemented curricular innovation to challenge both herself and her students to think bigger and be maximally impactful.

As the LBJ School’s first Chief Diversity Officer Victoria worked closely with the University’s leadership to cultivate and expand diversity, equity, and inclusion. She also served on the executive committee of the University of Texas’ Center for Mexican American Studies and the Provost’s Council on LGBTQ+AEI.

Victoria is the proud graduate of the University of Arizo

Biography

Dr. Victoria M. DeFrancesco Soto is a fellow at the Center for Politics and Governance at the LBJ School of Public Affairs at the University of Texas. Victoria is currently a Senior Analyst for Latino Decisions and a Senior Fellow at the Bernard Center for Women, Politics, and Public Policy. Her research on political behavior has been widely published in scholarly journals and cited in the New York Times, Los Angeles Times, Chicago Tribune, Time, and POLITICO. Fluent in both English and Spanish, Victoria provides political analysis on both US politics and its implications for countries abroad.

Victoria’s research analyzes how social identities shape political behavior. Her academic work focuses on: campaigns and elections, political marketing, women, race and ethnic politics, and immigration. She also serves on the editorial board of Politics,Groups, and Identities. She is currently working on a book project that looks at the integration of Latinos in the American polity.

In her media analysis Victoria is passionate about making social science relatable to real time political events. Victoria is a MSNBC contributor and a regular political analyst for Telemundo. She is also a regular blogger for POLITICO’S Arena, Huffington Post, and NBCLatino.

Victoria received her Ph.D. in political science from Duke University and was recently named one of the top 12 scholars in the country by Diverse magazine. She has also taught at Northwestern University and Rutgers. Victoria is a proud native of Cochise County in Southern Arizona. She is of Italian-Jewish-Mexican heritage and lives in beautiful Austin, Texas with her husband Neftali Garcia.

-- drvmds.com