Matthew Kraft, Associate Professor of Education and Economics, Brown University, presented work in progress at the Annenberg Institute at Brown University on April 5, 2022. The talk was part of Annenberg’s Education Policy Workshop Series, an hour-long “works in progress” seminar centered on empirical research related to education and education policy. Speakers come from a variety of disciplinary traditions, and the series welcomes faculty, postdocs, graduate students, and research staff from across the university who are interested in empirical research in education.

In this talk, DiPrete draws on systematic analysis of cross-national data from the U.S., Germany, and France to ask: does learning occupation-specific skills enhance one's labor market outcomes? Is it beneficial to have an educational degree that is linked to only one or a small set of occupations? DiPrete argues that, because there is a great deal of variation in the strength of the education-labor market link across Western societies, the answers to these questions are highly dependent on how strongly linked the education system is to the labor market. Amid rising income inequality, an institutional environment that promotes strong school-to-work pathways appears to be an effective strategy for providing workers with secure, well-paying jobs.

Thomas A. DiPrete is Giddings Professor of Sociology, co-director of the Institute for Social and Economic Research and Policy (ISERP), co-director of the Center for the Study of Wealth and Inequality at Columbia University, and a faculty member of the Columbia Population Research Center.  DiPrete holds a B.S. degree from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, and a Ph.D. from Columbia University.  He has been on the faculty of the University of Chicago, Duke University, and the University of Wisconsin–Madison as well as Columbia. DiPrete’s research interests include social stratification, demography, education, economic sociology, and quantitative methodology.  A specialist in comparative research, DiPrete has held research appointments at the Max Planck Institute for Human Development in Berlin, the Social Science Research Center – Berlin, the German Institute for Economic Research in Berlin, the VU University Amsterdam, the Netherlands Institute for Advanced Study in the Humanities and Social Sciences, and the University of Amsterdam.  His recent and ongoing projects include the study of gender differences in educational performance, educational attainment, and fields of study, the determinants of college persistence and dropout in the U.S., a comparative study of how educational expansion and the structure of linkages between education and the labor market contribute to earnings inequality in several industrialized countries, and the study of how social comparison processes affect the compensation of corporate executives.

Moderated by Jayanti Owens, Mary Tefft and John Hazen White, Sr. Assistant Professor of Public and International Affairs and Sociology

Thomas DiPrete, Professor of Sociology, Columbia University, presented “How Much Does Schooling Pay? School-to-Work Linkages in Comparative Context” at the Annenberg Institute at Brown University on September 19, 2019.

Webinar Objectives

• Explore approaches to instruction in underserved communities 
• Identify opportunities and challenges in serving these communities 
• Learn about two successful school models which may be replicable in other situations and geographies 

Sponsored by Annenberg Institute and Akanksha.

Nancy Waymack, Director of Research Partnerships and Policy, National Student Support Accelerator, presented “Best Practices for Community Collaboration in Schools: Creating a Sound Learning Ecosystem” at the Annenberg Institute at Brown University on September 29, 2022 in a virtual session.

The talk examined the influence of school accountability goals on educators' implicit bias. Joshua Bleiberg, Postdoctoral Research Associate, Brown University, presented “The Influence of School Accountability Goals on the Educator Implicit Bias” at the Annenberg Institute at Brown University on November 2, 2021. The talk was part of Annenberg’s Education Policy Workshop Series, an hour-long “works in progress” seminar centered on empirical research related to education and education policy. Speakers come from a variety of disciplinary traditions, and the series welcomes faculty, postdocs, graduate students, and research staff from across the university who are interested in empirical research in education.

Jonathan Collins, Assistant Professor of Education, Brown University, presented work in progress at the Annenberg Institute at Brown University on May 4, 2021 in a virtual session. The talk was part of the Annenberg Seminars on Educational Policy, a series that brings education researchers from institutions across the country to Brown to present and discuss their work.

Is More Autonomy Better? How School Actors Perceive School Autonomy and Effectiveness in Context

Despite the popularity of school autonomy as a policy strategy for school improvement, we know little about how school actors use autonomy to influence organizational performance and how this might vary across different contexts. This paper describes school autonomy, its perceived effectiveness, and how these phenomena are shaped by school and district contexts. We use contingency theory to guide our analysis of case study data from eight schools in the Denver Public Schools (DPS) district which vary in school governance, performance, and demographics. We interviewed school principals, teachers, teacher leaders, parents, and other charter and district administrators in the 2016-17 school year, totaling 73 participants. Our school cases reported different levels of perceived autonomy that varied according to school governance model. Most school cases perceived these levels of autonomy as effective for achieving school goals. Several internal and external contingencies shaped these perceptions of effectiveness albeit in different ways depending on autonomy level including: task uncertainty in each school’s mission, school leadership quality, support and resources from intermediate entities, teacher organizational fit, and efforts to coordinate decision-making across school actors or organizational sub-units.

Moderator: Mimi Lyon, Post-Doctoral Research Associate, Annenberg Institute

Ayesha Hashim, Assistant Professor, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, and Chris Torres, Associate Professor, Michigan State University, presented “Is More Autonomy Better? How School Actors Perceive School Autonomy and Effectiveness in Context” at the Annenberg Institute at Brown University on March 24, 2021 in a virtual session. The talk was part of the Annenberg Seminars on Educational Policy, a series that brings education researchers from institutions across the country to Brown to present and discuss their work.

Kathleen Lynch, Postdoctoral Research Associate, Annenberg Institute at Brown University, presented “Strengthening STEM Instruction in Schools: Learning From Research” at the Institute on November 19, 2019. The talk was part of Annenberg’s Education Policy Workshop Series, an hour-long “works in progress” seminar centered on empirical research related to education and education policy. Speakers come from a variety of disciplinary traditions, and the series welcomes faculty, postdocs, graduate students, and research staff from across the university who are interested in empirical research in education.

The talk examined student misconduct and learning outcomes using Pennsylvania K-12 building-level records from 1999 to 2018. Robert Strauss, Professor of Economics, presented “Student Misconduct and Learning Outcomes: Evidence from Pennsylvania’s K-12 Building Records: 1999-2018” at the Annenberg Institute at Brown University on February 1, 2022. The talk was part of Annenberg’s Education Policy Workshop Series, an hour-long “works in progress” seminar centered on empirical research related to education and education policy. Speakers come from a variety of disciplinary traditions, and the series welcomes faculty, postdocs, graduate students, and research staff from across the university who are interested in empirical research in education.

NYT Education Reporter discusses her coverage of college admission, segregation/integration, and her path from Brown. Susanna Loeb, director of the Annenberg Institute, will lead the conversation with Dana Goldstein.

Co-sponsored by The Watson Institute.

Dana Goldstein is a national correspondent for The New York Times. She is the author of the bestselling “The Teacher Wars: A History of America's Most Embattled Profession,” and a two-time finalist for The Livingston Award. Since joining The Times in 2017, she has covered the teacher walkout movement, changes in how students are selected for gifted programs and debates over school segregation, writing instruction, pre-K teaching methods and private school vouchers. Previously, she was a reporter for The Marshall Project, covering criminal justice, and a contributor to Slate and The Atlantic. She began her journalism career as a writer and editor at The American Prospect, where she covered the 2008 presidential campaign.

Susanna Loeb is the Director of the Annenberg Institute at Brown University and Professor of Education and Professor of International and Public Affairs. Susanna's research focuses broadly on education policy and it's role in improving educational opportunities for students. Her work has addressed issues of educator career choices and professional development, of school finance and governance, and of early childhood systems. Before moving to Brown, Susanna was the Barnett Family Professor of Education at Stanford University. She was the founding director of the Center for Education Policy at Stanford and co-director of Policy Analysis for California Education. Susanna led the research for both Getting Down to Facts projects for California schools. She has been a member of the National Board for Education Sciences, a senior fellow at the Stanford Institute for Economic Policy Research, and a faculty research fellow at the National Bureau of Economic Research.

Dana Goldstein, national correspondent, The New York Times, presented “Dana Goldstein ─ NYT Reporter on How Education Policies Impact Families, Students and Teachers” at the Annenberg Institute at Brown University on March 2, 2020.

The talk examined access to public school board meetings as sites of political contestation. Susan Moffitt, Professor of Political Science and International and Public Affairs and Director of Academic Programs, Brown University, presented “Opportunities to Protest: Access to Public School Board Meetings as Sites of Contestation” at the Annenberg Institute at Brown University on March 28, 2024. The talk was part of Annenberg’s Education Policy Workshop Series, an hour-long “works in progress” seminar centered on empirical research related to education and education policy. Speakers come from a variety of disciplinary traditions, and the series welcomes faculty, postdocs, graduate students, and research staff from across the university who are interested in empirical research in education.