Department of Sociology

José Zachary Canto
Biographical Sketch
George J. Mitchell Scholarship Winner

José Zachary Canto (“Zach”), a native Baltimorean, is a senior at Georgetown University where he is a major in Sociology. His academic interests have particularly focused on urban poverty and antipoverty policy. These interests have translated into lived experiences where he has taught summer school courses for elementary school children in the District of Columbia through the AmeriCorp program; operated tax preparation clinics for working homeless persons as part of his community-based research with the National Law Center on Homelessness & Poverty; and served as a community surveyor in the Carver Terrace Re-development Project conducted by Georgetown sociologists in connection with their community-based learning courses.

Since January of 2006, Zach has conducted research regarding faith-based housing and economic development in the District of Columbia through grants awarded by the Georgetown Undergraduate Research Opportunities Program (GUROP). With the guidance of Professor Sam Marullo’s community-based Sociology course, Zach helped create a development potential index that ranks faith-based organizations on their potential to complete a development project. This systematic approach to assessing the development potential of faith-based organizations has been used by development corporations that are interested in forming mutually beneficial partnerships with faith-based community organizations.

Zach’s research and activities regarding faith-based housing together with his fine academic record earned him a prestigious Mitchell scholarship to Ireland for the 2007-2008 academic year. He will be attending the University College Dublin to study for a Masters of Social Science in Sociology. There he intends to continue to research the challenges associated with providing affordable housing to the urban poor and with promoting economic development in Dublin and other European cities. He expects to join the work being done by Professor Diane Payne.

After his time in Ireland, Zach plans to pursue a joint Ph.D./J.D. program and to develop a career as a public interest lawyer, academic, and antipoverty activist.