Christopher Lubienski

Hypothesizes that some of the most influential education-focused organizations are advancing their agendas by engaging media and drawing on individuals who possess substantial media acumen, yet may not possess traditionally defined educational expertise.

Compares the relative role of research use in education policy to other issues, such as climate science, and highlight the growing role of intermediate actors as they shape research use. Considers common characteristics of these policy issues that may contribute to misuse or disuse, as well as to greater consideration of research.

Considers how charters are or are not instances of privatization in education, showing that the marketized environment they are intended to nurture serves as a route for profit-seeking strategies. As charter schools often act like profit-seeking entities, but fail to achieve expected academic and equity outcomes, the concluding discussion considers how these schools’ most important role is in serving as a vehicle for privatizing public policy – diminishing the public while enhancing the position and influence of private interests and organizations in education policymaking.

Examines and critiques the empirical claims made by homeschooling proponents to justify further expansion and deregulation of the movement, and sheds light on the homeschool advocacy agenda explicit in those claims.

Challenges the conventional wisdom that private is better in schooling – an assumption at the heart of current reform efforts such as charter schools and voucher programs. Instead, the evidence suggests that tried-and-true measures such as teacher certification and teachers’ pedagogical and content knowledge explain the relative effectiveness of public schools.

Examines the developing empirical track record of charter schools over the last two decades in areas such as achievement, innovation, integration and equity. Among the major findings is that the rapid growth of this movement often preceded and, indeed, often ignored any evidence on the effectiveness of these schools.

Investigates patterns of access across three highly competitive local education markets to determine how school choices are arranged, finding that all three cases showed patterns of exclusionary strategies that schools embraced to enhance market position.