🚨New data alert! I published data from my working paper on university governing boards on the Harvard Dataverse. This is the 2023 wave of data, but I'm working with a team of RAs on many more years. Let me know if you use the data! Data: doi.org/10.7910/DVN/... Paper: edworkingpapers.com/ai25-1212

In a new Brookings piece, I wrote about how the US Department of Education has turned civil rights enforcement into a tool to promote segregation and discrimination. www.brookings.edu/articles/how...

📢 #EdWorkingPapers: @taylorodle.bsky.social & @isabelmcmullen.bsky.social evaluate Advise TN’s expansion across 33 communities and find the program increased college enrollment by 6%. 📄 Read more: edworkingpapers.com/ai25-1371

Excellent explainer and even-toned reminder from @katharinemeyer.bsky.social about the potential harms to student borrowers that can arise from both policy AND runaway narratives that social media enables www.brookings.edu/articles/def...

Helpful report for situating boards within broader inter/national trends of partisan control of higher ed. I increasingly think we need focus on reforms that fall between letting boards oversee themselves and those that rise to state constitutional amendment www.americanprogress.org/article/how-...

Attending #2025APPAM? Check out IRP scholar @isabelmcmullen.bsky.social of the Dept of Poli Sci at the UW-Madison, presenting this paper: “Exploring the Mechanisms and Direct Impact of College Access Advising: The Case of AdviseTN.” Th 11/13, 3:30-5pm, Hyatt Regency Seattle, 5th Flr, Rm: 505

A new analysis by the Upjohn Institute finds that the Rx Kids program delivers measurable economic benefits to families and the broader local economy in Flint, Michigan. Read the full report www.upjohn.org/research-hig...

🍎🦡 I'm recruiting a PhD student in Ed Policy (fall '26) at @uwmadison.bsky.social! Come work with me on college access, admissions, & fin aid in our top-ranked, fully-funded program. I’m especially excited for this student to immediately join our direct admissions RCT team.

Good morning, Badgers. Welcome to the Fall 2025 semester. We wish you a successful start to your academic year. Let’s begin.

An @afm-union.bsky.social and @sagaftra.org gal. An NFLPA guy. We love a union love story. Congrats Taylor Swift and Travis Kelce!

This piece pulls together a lot of recent examples of board-driven actions in higher ed, and rightfully points out that when boards become politicized, they are then subject to those politics at all levels of government: apnews.com/article/harv...

The job market for PhDs may be terrible, but the spectrum internet person that just helped me transfer my internet ended the call by telling me I'm gonna do great things with my degree, so there's that.

In our 2024 U.S. Post-Election Reflection via @apsa.bsky.social, Rebecca Jacobsen and I preview some of our ongoing research on how partisanship and nationalization influence on-cycle local school board elections.

Morning! I did a lil analysis and turns out that, when ED employees are illegally fired and contracts are canceled, ED is unable to fulfill its congressional mandate to publish national statistics on the condition of education. Why does that matter? Well... www.brookings.edu/articles/the...

This piece picks up on a lot of important threads of board dynamics, one of which is that for publics, while there isn't the same conspicuousness as with Harvard/Columbia, the same politics are playing out, just more quietly and with less opportunity to rally against www.nytimes.com/2025/06/05/u...

Governing boards are at the center of every higher ed story these days. What do we know about board governance? What does board composition look like nationwide, and how is it shaped by partisan appointments? My new working paper introduces new data to these questions: edworkingpapers.com/ai25-1212

You might as well just hold on to your convictions, since abandoning them all is clearly not a viable strategy against eroding higher ed governance

The Upjohn Institute is looking for a research analyst to support our research on employment issues. Please share with your networks. #econsky #hiring www.upjohn.org/employment-o...

Weather is getting nice, what if 10 million people went outside at the same time

Board composition, transparency, and accountability to stakeholders matters to the future of higher ed. Inclusive boards of trustees have the intellectual dexterity and structural muscle to make insightful, valued-based decisions that serve missions in harmony with the needs of the stakeholders.

Playing this as my hype music before my dissertation proposal defense today

With all of the targeting of higher ed, it's critical that we have a good understanding of who governs our institutions - I wrote this piece for Brookings to summarize what we know. I also show some new data on the politics and representativeness of public boards. www.brookings.edu/articles/und...

My dad's sign for the #handsoff rally in my hometown of Kalamazoo where apparently a few thousand turned out!

Wisconsin is critical for any presidential candidate, and Wisconsin LOVES when a sharp, no-nonsense, hometown woman on the ballot. Just saying.

Calling results from November "overwhelming" means we need a new word to describe this massive 10 point win by Crawford. www.nytimes.com/interactive/...

What comes next for higher ed? @katharinemeyer.bsky.social and I wrote this piece on pandemic-era funding streams and the window they give into what turning decision-making to the states might mean. Plus more on district implications here too: www.brookings.edu/articles/wha...

Thoughts on turning @aefpweb.bsky.social this year into, oh I don't know, one giant protest?

🚨 Join us this Fri 2/28 @ 1:30PM, ET for an online webinar with education and legal scholars, including experts in civil rights enforcement, to discuss the legality of the Department of Education's Feb 14 Dear Colleague Letter & the potential threat of enforcement. www.brookings.edu/events/what-...

Two new pieces in our series on why we have and need a US Department of Education! First up, from the past, current, and presidents-elect of AEFP and SREE - "Cutting research funding would make education less effective and efficient" www.brookings.edu/articles/cut...

Letter signed by 800+ people who hold PhDs in political science expressing grave concern about the degredation of US institutions, rule of law, and democracy. Share with Congress, print for dramatic display, or cite as evidence of experts’ collective alarm. drive.google.com/file/d/1lGk2...

heads up, badgers

An important part of the legacy work of IES is the predoc program that trains and launches education scholars - I'm worried for existing grants and sad to think there likely won't be a cohort coming up behind us.

Every Child Left Behind

National Student Clearinghouse just emailed a big correction to ed reporters: freshman enrollment did not fall by 5% in Fall 2024, it INCREASED. We all blamed the FAFSA roll out fiasco with tamping down college going. But that was wrong. Revised figs to come out Jan 23

Here are some of my favorite data visualizations, charts, and graphs, I created for the @upjohninstitute.bsky.social Policies for Place this year! (1/8)

From my report "The Kalamazoo Promise: A Piece in the Puzzle of Housing Preferences" but based on research by @bradhershbein.bsky.social and @isabelmcmullen.bsky.social Since the introduction of the Kalamazoo Promise, more graduates of Kalamazoo Public Schools report staying in the community. (5/8)

Carbon dioxide emissions from Big Ten football team travel for regular-season conference games more than tripled in 2024 compared to 2023 after 4 West Coast schools were added. A report from @cnsmd.bsky.social

I do not donate to my employer because we are already in a labor for compensation relationship. I'm very confused by these emails.

Amazon has repeatedly violated labor standards with unsafe and inhumane working conditions and continues to do so today. This Cyber Monday, consider shopping somewhere else.

Introducing ourselves on Bluesky like a true Michigander.

Dissertation Award first-prize winner Angela Wyse is an assistant professor of economics at Dartmouth College. Wyse’s dissertation considers fundamental questions around the U.S. homeless population, using data that is detailed, accurate, longitudinal and nationally representative. 📉📈(1/4)

New paper from @isabelmcmullen.bsky.social and @dcollier74.bsky.social , both late of the Upjohn Institute, looks at some of the bumps of even generous free-tuition college scholarship programs such as the Kalamazoo Promise. #EduSky

🎉My first ever first-author paper is published! With my perennial coauthor @dcollier74.bsky.social, we look at enrollment change during COVID among tuition free recipients at a community college. It's one of many great articles in the latest NDCC issue! onlinelibrary.wiley.com/toc/15360733...

My network on here is so professional-leaning I'm at real risk of this just being academic LinkedIn. Anybody have suggestions for fun follows??

After being an RA for so long to now doing my own research, it's funny how many times a day I have little judgement call questions about data/definitions/etc. and my first thought is still oh I gotta go ask...me. I'm the one who has to make those calls now 🧐

My writing lesson for today is sometimes all it takes is writing the title of a half-baked paper to give yourself clarity on what the heck you are actually trying to ask and answer.

So, what's the deal over here? Are folks with both platforms posting in parallel? Curious to see how the academic circles are doing.