Opinion
School & District Management Opinion

Education Research Needs a Policy Makeover

By Carolyn Sattin-Bajaj — January 11, 2017 4 min read
  • Save to favorites
  • Print

The largely unexpected results of the 2016 presidential race sent shock waves through many sectors of society. Pollsters and members of the news media have had to publicly come to terms with their failures to predict the outcome of the election—the win of President-elect Donald Trump—or to accurately capture the views of a large proportion of the American electorate. On the other hand, many academics in institutions of higher education have gone through a private process of reflection about how to make sense of evidence indicating their perspectives are out of sync with a large swath of the public.

While a majority of university-based researchers consider themselves politically progressive—this has been the case historically and in the present day—current political and ideological divides are having an impact on relationships between students and faculty in different and potentially more damaging ways than in the past. Discussions about the consequences of having so few conservative voices on university faculties are not new, but this election brought to light the degree to which academics have been operating in echo chambers.

How Left-Leaning Are Universities?

Explore the geographic distribution of 2017 RHSU Edu-Scholars concentrations and the political composition of their universities’ faculty.

BRIC ARCHIVE

Source: Mitchell Langbert, Anthony J. Quain, and Daniel B. Klein (Econ Journal Watch, 2016); Associated Press

Because humans have a natural desire to associate with like-minded people, it is no surprise that researchers tend to collaborate with colleagues who share their worldviews and are similarly motivated to study the same empirical questions. But if the job of education researchers (of whom I am one) is to produce the most rigorous, policy-relevant research possible, we are limiting ourselves by staying in our comfort zone.

This harms the quality of our work. The recent emphasis in higher education on interdisciplinary, multi-method research has not included a similar push for the inclusion of multiple ideological perspectives. The tendency to work with scholars who concur on political and policy-related questions contradicts evidence about the value of diverse perspectives for improved decisionmaking.

See Also

For more in this package, please visit:

Our society also suffers from a lack of examples inside and outside the academy for how to engage people from across the ideological spectrum in constructive research and policy debates. Publicly engaged researchers are uniquely poised to leverage their platforms—such as academic publications, conference panels, public-speaking events, Twitter, and blogposts—to model the kind of productive dialogue that used to take place decades ago on the floor of the U.S. Senate, in television roundtables, and in university lecture halls. Such exchanges, in which ideas were tested and challenged on merits, not political grounds, can serve to strengthen policy proposals and opportunities for collaboration with colleagues from across the aisle.

Who Are the 2017 RHSU Edu-Scholar Rising Stars?

This table lists the top 10 junior scholars who have not yet received tenure, according to the 2017 RHSU Edu-Scholar Public Influence Rankings.

BRIC ARCHIVE

President-elect Trump’s nomination of Betsy DeVos, a long-standing advocate of school vouchers and limited regulation of charter schools, for secretary of education is a telling example of both the dialogue that research and practice stand to benefit from and the ideological clashes that are distracting us.

A small cadre of scholars responded to the announcement of DeVos’ selection by engaging in highly public, evidenced-based discussions about the impacts of charter schools and voucher programs. At the same time, other educators and advocates seized the spotlight on charter schools and voucher programs to advance purely ideological positions for or against such policies. The cacophony of voices too easily drowns out a reasoned exchange of ideas, and the power of informed debates to positively influence policy and public opinion gets diluted.

The moment is ripe for institutions of higher education and their researchers to invest in ways to better fulfill important societal functions as bastions of civil debate and laboratories for well-balanced peer-reviewed research.

To do so, universities should create formal opportunities for scholars of diverse methodological, disciplinary, and ideological perspectives to engage with each other’s work and to model how respectful exchanges and debates can occur. This could happen, for example, through regularly scheduled roundtables, reading groups, or incentives for faculty members who might have little reason to interact to co-develop and co-teach courses.

The Public Influence of Edu-Scholars

Linda Darling-Hammond, Diane Ravitch, and Gloria Ladson-Billings took the top three spots in the 2017 RHSU Edu-Scholar Public Influence Rankings. Click on the chart below to learn who took the other two spots. (The affiliations cited are drawn from the scholars’ CVs.)

BRIC ARCHIVE

Faculty members should also commit to ensuring that their classroom climates are hospitable to all students. This means being cognizant of behaviors that may silence students whose opinions do not conform to the majority (often progressive) views. Faculty members should also facilitate debate among students in a supportive environment.

Finally, all researchers should engage in reflexivity: that is, work to identify the ideological underpinnings of their own work. Understanding how personal ideologies may influence approaches to research—what questions the authors ask, the theoretical foundations of their work, and the methods they employ—can be a starting point for new ways to be a publicly engaged scholar. Such self-awareness may prompt researchers and policymakers alike to identify their own blind spots and pursue professional relationships that advance their knowledge of alternate viewpoints.

Related Tags:

A version of this article appeared in the January 11, 2017 edition of Education Week as Education Research Needs a Policy Makeover

Events

Ed-Tech Policy Webinar Artificial Intelligence in Practice: Building a Roadmap for AI Use in Schools
AI in education: game-changer or classroom chaos? Join our webinar & learn how to navigate this evolving tech responsibly.
Education Webinar Developing and Executing Impactful Research Campaigns to Fuel Your Ed Marketing Strategy 
Develop impactful research campaigns to fuel your marketing. Join the EdWeek Research Center for a webinar with actionable take-aways for companies who sell to K-12 districts.
This content is provided by our sponsor. It is not written by and does not necessarily reflect the views of Education Week's editorial staff.
Sponsor
Privacy & Security Webinar
Navigating Cybersecurity: Securing District Documents and Data
Learn how K-12 districts are addressing the challenges of maintaining a secure tech environment, managing documents and data, automating critical processes, and doing it all with limited resources.
Content provided by Softdocs

EdWeek Top School Jobs

Teacher Jobs
Search over ten thousand teaching jobs nationwide — elementary, middle, high school and more.
View Jobs
Principal Jobs
Find hundreds of jobs for principals, assistant principals, and other school leadership roles.
View Jobs
Administrator Jobs
Over a thousand district-level jobs: superintendents, directors, more.
View Jobs
Support Staff Jobs
Search thousands of jobs, from paraprofessionals to counselors and more.
View Jobs

Read Next

School & District Management The Eclipse Is Great for Learning. But It's Tough on School Logistics
A total solar eclipse will cross a large swath of the country on April 8, sparking tough management choices for leaders of the districts in its path.
5 min read
A woman and stands outside with her arm on the back of a boy as they look up at the sky while wearing special paper glasses made for viewing a solar eclipse.
Jackie Johnson and her son Bradley Johnson, 9, watch a partial solar eclipse at the Frost Science Museum on Oct. 14, 2023, in downtown Miami. In 2024, some districts are planning to delay or cancel school on the day of a total eclipse, out of safety concerns.
Matias J. Ocner/Miami Herald via AP
School & District Management Opinion A Good Principal Knows When It's Time to Leave
I didn’t leave my job because of burnout; I stepped away from being a school leader because it was in everybody’s best interest.
Matthew Ebert
4 min read
Conceptual illustration of someone handing off a baton to someone else over a completed puzzle.
Vanessa Solis/Education Week via Canva
School & District Management Principals Tell Politicians on Capitol Hill: We’re Burning Out
Students' mental health top principals' growing list of concerns.
6 min read
People walk outside the U.S Capitol building in Washington, June 9, 2022.
Visitors walk outside the U.S Capitol building in Washington on June 9, 2022.
Patrick Semansky/AP
School & District Management Women Superintendents Experience Bias on the Climb to Leadership
Interpersonal slights and inequities make it hard for women to land the job and stay in it.
3 min read
Woman stands in front of a staircase in different colors. She is about to walk up the stairs. Concept of standing in front of a challenge and finding the right solution and courage to move on.
mikkelwilliam/E+