Michael Ornstein, Professor of Sociology at York University, was appointed Director of the Institute for Social Research (ISR) on January 1, 2000. Dr. Ornstein obtained his PhD from the Johns Hopkins University in 1971 and joined the Department of Sociology at York in the same year. Dr. Ornstein joined the Institute as a Research Associate in 1973, was appointed Assistant Director in 1979, and became an Associate Director in 1982. He is a frequent contributor to the Canadian Journal of Sociology and Anthropology (CJSA) and has served as an editorial member for both CJSA and the Canadian Journal of Sociology.

Dr. Ornstein has been active in the development, design and execution of numerous large scale research projects at the Institute, including the Quality of Life project which took place from 1977 to 1981. He also directed the first Canadian study on knowledge, behaviours and attitudes about AIDS, and has recently completed a set of reports on social assistance in Ontario and ethno-racial inequality in Metropolitan Toronto using Census data.

Much of Dr. Ornstein's research has dealt with social class, ideology, elite theory and politics, and he has made considerable use of survey data in his research. Two recent publications attest to his ongoing research interest in substantive, as well as methodological, issues: Politics and Ideology in Canada: Elite and Public Opinion in the Transformation of the Welfare State (with H. Michael Stevenson, 1999) and "Trend Report on Survey Research" in Current Sociology (1998).

When asked about his goals for the Institute during his tenure as Director, Dr. Ornstein responded: "I hope that ISR can build upon its strengths, providing service to the York community and conducting surveys for academic, NGO, and government researchers across Canada. At the same time, ISR needs to be active in initiating research and becoming a home for quantitative social researchers on the campus. Especially in survey research, I hope that ISR can play more of a role in teaching. We must continue to provide excellent statistical and design consultation to students and faculty at York, on a one-to-one basis and through short courses, to conduct evaluation research designed to improve the quality of teaching and services, and to provide researchers with access to survey data that we collect, as well as from Statistics Canada and other sources. We also need to expand our survey and data analysis work; ISR has a special role to play at York as the only major university-based survey research unit in Canada."