Rhode Island Department of Education Commissioner Ken Wagner announced that he is stepping down from his position to join the Annenberg Institute at Brown University as a Senior Fellow for Education Policy and Practice.

“I have been fortunate to work with an incredible team of people over the last three and a half years. Together, we have been able to create exciting new opportunities for students, to better support and invest in our teachers, and to distribute leadership so that each of us can understand the role we play in improving schools,” said Wagner.

Institute integrates with University, focuses on education inequality research

Loeb’s appointment followed a 2017 University review of the institute, which resulted in the University’s decision to shift Annenberg’s focus away from school reform and community mobilization and toward educational inequality research, said Provost Richard Locke P’18.

University groups move into collaborative hub that allows for more efficient research, innovation

As the scaffoldings came off of the University’s newest completed construction project, a renovation of 164 Angell St., occupants from five different divisions across campus moved into the office space.

The building now houses the Carney Institute for Brain Science, the Center for Computational Molecular Biology, the Data Science Initiative, the Department of Education and the Annenberg Institute for School Reform.

University professors Susanna Loeb, Kenneth Wong, Matthew Kraft and John Papay were named in the 2019 Rick Hess Straight Up Edu-Scholar Public Influence Rankings Jan. 9.

The list ranks the top 200 U.S. university scholars who most influenced “educational practice and policy” last year, according to an Education Week article written by Hess. Loeb was listed 104th, Wong tied at 143rd, and Kraft and Papay numbered 166th and 190th respectively, according to the ranking. A selection committee of 29 university professors chose the scholars, according to the article. The committee took a variety of categories into account, including the number of widely cited works written by the scholar, the number of times the scholar has been quoted or mentioned in U.S. newspapers and whether the scholar’s work has been utilized by a member of Congress, according to Hess’s breakdown of the selection process.

Can a student’s choice of college lift them out of poverty? John Friedman, an associate professor of economics and of international and public affairs, took on a massive statistical analysis to discern trends in access to colleges for low-income students. He and   colleagues at the Equality of Opportunity Project identified the schools that move the most low-income students up the economic ladder.

Friedman and the research team looked at 30 million students, using data that included family incomes in students’ teenage years, as well as statistics on the earnings of those graduates who have reached their early 30s. Students from divergent economic backgrounds who graduate from the same universities, he said, can achieve similar economic status later in life. With so much data, the study created a foundation for the development of policies that might increase access and mobility in a way that takes into account the specific characteristics of a place or higher education institution.

The Rhode Island Foundation has convened a group of education leaders and other stakeholders to craft a 10-year strategic vision for improving the state’s struggling public schools.

The foundation’s decision to create a Long-term Education Planning Committee was made before standardized test results released last week showed Rhode Island’s students trailing far behind their neighbors in Massachusetts, but president Neil Steinberg said he’s hopeful the woeful scores will create a sense of urgency for members of the group.

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Celebrate World Teachers’ Day with these 9 facts about educators https://t.co/q0fmbPL4F2

— Annenberg Institute at Brown (@AnnenbergInst) October 7, 2018