As we finish our end-of-year plans and holiday shopping/traveling, there is one thing that I am excited to give you a heads-up about: the imminent RHSU Edu-Scholar Public Influence Rankings. This year, the release of the 2023 rankings will occur during the first week of January.

These rankings recognize university-based education scholars, of any discipline or bent, for their contribution to the public square. The exercise is designed to balance the academy’s unfortunate tendency to discount scholarship that makes real, relevant contributions to vital public-policy debates. Edu-scholar influence encompasses both one’s corpus of scholarly work and one’s centrality to discussion of education policy or practice. After all, a scholar’s influence is a product of several factors, including their body of scholarship, the degree to which their work has influenced today’s researchers, their willingness to wade into public discourse, and the energy and effectiveness with which they speak to popular audiences.

The 200 ranked scholars include top finishers from 2022 and at-large selections chosen by the RHSU Selection Committee, a group of 28 accomplished and disciplinary, intellectually, and geographically diverse scholars (the full Selection Committee will be posted and acknowledged during the first week of January). Bottom line: Regardless of where they rank, each of the 200 scholars deserves credit just for making the list.