Principal Investigators

Don Boyd
Donald J. Boyd is deputy director of the Center for Policy Research, University at Albany, where his work includes research on teacher labor markets and school district finances. He is part of a research team examining the relationships between teacher preparation, student academic performance and teacher labor market choices. Dr. Boyd also is director of the Fiscal Studies Program at the Rockefeller Institute of Government, the public policy research arm of the State University of New York. The Fiscal Studies Program provides practical independent research about state and local government finances in the 50 states.
curriculum vitae

Pamela Grossman
Dr. Grossman is Professor and Chair of Curriculum and Teacher Education in the School of Education at Stanford University. Her research interests include teacher education, teacher knowledge, the teaching of English in secondary schools, and the teaching of practice in professional education.  Her current research includes the study of pathways into teaching in New York City schools with Don Boyd, Hamp Lankford, Susanna Loeb, and Jim Wyckoff, and a cross-professional study of preparation of clergy, teachers, and clinical psychologists.

Hamilton Lankford
Hamp Lankford teaches in the Economics Department at the University at Albany, State University of New York, where he is involved in a variety of activities that link research to education policy in New York. These include his role as an expert witness in the recently determined Campaign for Fiscal Equity lawsuit in which the NY Court of Appeals recently ruled New York’s system of funding for K-12 education in New York City was unconstitutional. He also served as a consultant to the New York State Special Commission on Educational Structure, Policies, and Practices (1993-94) and as a member of the NYS Board of Regents Technical Study Groups concerned with Cost Effectiveness in Education (1995) and the Generation of Revenues for Education (1994). More recently, he organized a symposium concerned with New York’s Teacher Workforce (2001) and participated in the Symposium on Education Finance and Organization Structure in NYS Schools (2004), both sponsored by the Education Finance Research Consortium. His academic publications in both economic and education policy journals include research on the teaching workforce, the allocation of education resources, the determinants of school choice and the effects of enhanced school choice. In ongoing research, he is a principal investigator on Teacher Pathways Project, focusing on the linkages between teacher preparation, teacher labor markets and student outcomes.
curriculum vitae

Susanna Loeb
Dr. Loeb is Associate Professor of Education at Stanford University.  She studies resource allocation, looking specifically at how teachers' preferences and teacher preparation policies affect the distribution of teaching quality across schools and how the structure of state finance systems affects the level and distribution of funds to districts.

James Wyckoff

Jim Wyckoff is Professor of Education at the University of Virginia.  Currently, he is working with colleagues to examine attributes of teacher preparation and induction programs that are effective in increasing the retention of teachers and the performance of students. He has written on a variety of educational policy issues, including school choice, the equity of school spending, the allocation of school expenditures, special education funding, and teacher retention. Wyckoff serves on the National Academy of Sciences Committee on the Study of Teacher Preparation Programs, directs the Education Finance Research Consortium, serves on the Policy Council for the Association of Public Policy Analysis and Management and the editorial boards of Education Finance and Policy and the Economics of Education Review and the Scientific Review Panel, U.S. Department of Education.

curriculum vitae

Research Associates

Karen Hammerness
Karen Hammerness is a Postdoctoral Fellow at Stanford University.  Her research focuses on teacher education practice and policy and the relationship between teachers' ideals, their practice and their careers. She is author of Seeing Through Teachers' Eyes: The role of vision in teachers' lives and work (available through Teachers College Press, April 2006).

Morva McDonald
Morva McDonald is an assistant professor in the department of Curriculum and Instruction at the University of Maryland, College Park.  Her interests are teacher education and the preparation of teachers for diversity and students' opportunities to learn outside of school, with a focus on issues of social justice and socio-cultural approaches to studying teaching and education.

Michelle Reininger
Michelle is an assistant Professor at Northwestern University and Faculty Fellow at the Institute for Policy Research.  Her research interests include the economics of education, teacher labor markets, the role of community colleges in teacher supply, and teacher retention and turnover. 

Matthew Ronfeldt
Matt is a Research Assistant at Stanford University. In addition to his work on the Pathways Project, Matt also works as Research Assistant with Pam Grossman on the "Teaching Practices" project.  His research interests are the pedagogy of teacher education, particularly how it relates to novice teachers as they transition into fieldwork, teaching and their first teaching positions.