VARC News

The Value Added Research Center is working with Minnesota educators to identify great teachers and how they got to be that way. Read the article at MinnPost.com.

More news...

Recent VARC Publications

Upcoming Events

VARC: Value-Added Research

LEADERSHIP

Robert Meyer
rhmeyer@wisc.edu | Phone: (608) 265-5663
Office: 1186A Ed Sciences
Website

Robert H. Meyer is research professor and director of the Value-Added Research Center at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. Before that, he was on the faculty of the Harris School at the University of Chicago and the Economics Department at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. Dr. Meyer is known for his research on value-added modeling and evaluation methods and is currently working intensively with school districts in Atlanta, Chicago, Hillsborough County (Florida), Los Angeles, Madison, Milwaukee, Minneapolis, New York City, and Tulsa; as well as with the states of Minnesota, North Dakota, South Dakota, and Wisconsin.

Over the past two decades he has worked collaboratively with these districts and states to build value-added and performance management systems to inform decision making with respect to policy and school improvement strategies. He is co-leading a major initiative with in Minnesota and the Dakotas (and their partner school districts) to provide value-added information to all teachers and to the colleges and universities that prepared these teachers. Dr. Meyer is currently working with many districts and states to expand value-added systems to include courses not typically covered by assessments under No Child Left Behind. He has conducted major statistical evaluations of programs and policies such as class size reduction, literacy, and Supplemental Educational Services. Meyer received a Senior Urban Education Research Fellowship from the Council of Great City Schools in 2007 and in 2010 received the University of Wisconsin-Madison, Chancellor's Award for Excellence in Research.

STAFF

Jason Beach
jbeach@wisc.edu | Phone: (608) 262-7283
Office: 1180 Educational Sciences

Jason Beach is an analyst in the Value-Added Research Center (VARC) at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. Jason focuses on the evaluation of Supplemental Educational Services, particularly for the cities of Dallas, Austin, and Chicago. His previous work involved implementing mixed-effects models for evaluating effectiveness of programs in experimental and observational settings. These evaluation analyses included programs for the Wisconsin Department of Transportation, Iraqi Ministry of Defence, and Iraqi Ministry of Oil. Jason earned an M.S. in Statistics from the University of Wisconsin-Madison, and a B.S. from the United States Military Academy at West Point, NY.

Fred Boehm
fjboehm@wisc.edu | Phone: (608) 262-6840
Office: 1180 Educational Sciences

Fred Boehm was born in Springfield, Illinois and grew up in Stevens Point, Wisconsin. He went to college at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, where he studied chemistry, mathematics, and biochemistry. After earning a medical degree from the UW-Madison, he worked on genome-wide association studies in the University of Washington's biostatistics department. He joined VARC in January 2011, and currently works on the development of state-wide value added models.

Daniel Bolt
dmbolt@wisc.edu | Phone: 608-262-4938
Office: 1082A Educational Sciences

Daniel Bolt is a professor in the quantitative methods area of the department of educational psychology at the University of Wisconsin, Madison. He specializes in the area of psychometrics, and in particular on methodological issues related to measurement. His primary area of research is in item response theory (IRT), including issues related to multidimensionality, equating, and differential item functioning. Applications include test data from both standardized tests as well as self-report measures. A recent focus of interest is on the use of IRT to study and accommodate response styles in self-report data.

His methodological work has been published in various outlets, including the Journal of Educational and Behavioral Statistics, the Journal of Educational Measurement, Psychometrika, and Applied Psychological Measurement. Dan also frequently consults with faculty and researchers on campus on issues related to measurement and applications of statistical methods. He received his Ph.D. in psychology from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign in 1999, and was recognized by the National Council on Measurement in Education (NCME) with the Jason Millman Promising Scholar Award in 2003.

Regina Brown
figueiredobr@wisc.edu | Phone: (608) 263-4295
Office: 1161B Ed Sciences

Regina is a project assistant working with the Value Added Research Project. She is a graduate student in Educational Policy Studies. Prior to returning to  graduate school, Regina worked in various capacities in public, private and  charter schools including teacher, counselor and principal. Her interests lie in K-12 online education, privatization and school choice. She has a BA and MEd from The Ohio State University..

Eric Camburn
ecamburn@education.wisc.edu | Phone: (608) 263-3697
Office: 1186C Ed Sciences
Website

Eric Camburn has a PhD from the University of Chicago Measurement, Evaluation, and Statistical Analysis (MESA) program. His research focuses on urban public schools and their improvement. His early work documented the difficulty poor and minority students in urban schools have in negotiating the transitions from elementary school to high school and from high school to postsecondary education. His current research centers around understanding efforts to improve instruction in urban schools; including programmatic efforts to improve instruction; the organizational factors that support such improvement efforts; and the impact such change efforts have on leadership practice, instruction, and student achievement. In support of his research on instructional improvement in urban settings, Camburn’s current work also focuses on the measurement of instruction and leadership practice. Much of Camburn’s research involves the use of multi-level statistical models, but he has also conducted a number of mixed-method investigations. Camburn and his co-authors won the William J. Davis Memorial Award for the most outstanding article in the journal Educational Administration Quarterly in 2000.

Bradley Carl
brcarl@wisc.edu | Phone: (608) 263-3040
Office: 1152B Ed Sciences

Bradley Carl serves as the VARC Embedded Researcher for the Milwaukee Public Schools (MPS). In this capacity, he splits time between WCER and the MPS Division of Research & Assessment to conduct program evaluations and research involving key MPS initiatives and district improvement efforts. Examples of completed work conducted to date include evaluations of MPS high schools, charter schools, and summer school programs; a single-gender classroom initiative at an MPS middle school; and the MPS/Milwaukee Recreation Arts Partnership program. His ongoing work includes evaluations of programs to improve transitions to high school, a postsecondary tracking system for MPS graduates, and an "early warning" system to identify students at high risk of failing to graduate from high school and graduating with low levels of college and workforce readiness. Dr. Carl holds a B.A. in International Studies and History from Hamline University and a Ph.D. in Sociology-Urban Studies from Michigan State University. He worked previously for the American Institutes for Research in Washington, D.C.; the Office of Educational Accountability at the Wisconsin Department of Public Instruction; and the Center on Education and Work at UW-Madison.

Brie Chapa
bchapa@wisc.edu | Phone: (608) 263-1902
Office: 1161G Educational Sciences

Brie Chapa is our data manager at the Value-Added Research Center (VARC) at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. She has a B.S. in Secondary Mathematics Education from UW-Madison. After a few years of teaching in the field, she was hired as a data processor for the SCALE partnership at the Wisconsin Center for Education Research (WCER). Her SCALE work focused on data reporting and addressing issues of data quality. As VARC data manager, she oversees data acquisition protocols, data transfer, and data protection/security. In addition she develops new systems within VARC to improve data use, efficiency, and collaboration among staff.

Huiping "Emily" Cheng
hcheng6@wisc.edu | Phone: (608) 265-2620
Office: 1180 Ed Sciences

Huiping Cheng is an associate researcher in the Value-Added Researcher Center (VARC). Ms. Cheng actively engages in the design and implementation of statistical analysis to evaluate impact of educational interventions in the partner school districts. Projects she has worked on include the quantitative research of the SAGE program, the evaluation of Supplemental Educational Services and the Accountability and Performance in Secondary Education project in the Milwaukee Public Schools. Ms. Cheng earned her Masters degree in Economics from the University of Virginia in 2005 and joined VARC in July, 2007.

Michael Christian
mchristian2@wisc.edu | Phone: (608) 263-4235
Office: 1190 Ed Sciences

Michael Christian has been an assistant scientist at the Wisconsin Center for Education Research since November 2006. He has worked in the Value-Added Research Center since joining WCER. His work at WCER has focused on developing and estimating value-added models for Chicago, Milwaukee, and Madison and on providing technical assistance for districts and states participating in the Teacher Incentive Fund (TIF) program. He received a Ph.D. in economics from the University of Michigan in 2004. Before joining WCER, he worked as a staff economist at the Bureau of Economic Analysis of the U.S. Department of Commerce.

Penny Clark
plclark@wisc.edu | Phone: (608) 262-9893
Office: 1152A Ed Sciences

Penny Clark is the research manager at the Value-Added Research Center (VARC) at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. In May 2000, she graduated with degrees in psychology and French from UW-Madison. She has worked for the University since graduation and joined VARC in September 2008.  Her main tasks with VARC include: Organizing people and resources; communication with director, assistant director, and staff; project reporting; and project planning.

Mike Clutterbuck
clutterbuck@wisc.edu |
Office: 1186 Ed Sciences

Mike Clutterbuck is an associate research specialist at the Value-Added Research Center (VARC) at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. Following a year abroad where he studied Economics at the University of Bristol in the United Kingdom, he recently graduated in December 2010 from UW-Madison with a B.A. in Economics with Math Emphasis . Currently, he is assisting with data manipulation and analysis on the Hillsborough County Value-Added project.

Katherine Delaney
kkdelaney@wisc.edu |
Office: 1177 Ed Sciences

Katherine (Kate) Delaney is a Project Assistant in the Value-Added Research Center (VARC) at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. Kate's work for the current project examines how a District level school reform for data-based decision making plays out across all levels of the district (administration, school leaders, teachers and their classrooms). Kate is a PhD student in Curriculum & Instruction with a focus on Early Childhood Education. In particular, she is interested in prekindergarten policy, practice and curriculum, as well as early childhood teacher education and professional development. Kate has worked as a preschool teacher in both university lab school and urban public school settings. Before coming to Madison, Kate taught in the early childhood teacher education program at UW-Milwaukee. She holds an MS in Curriculum and Instruction from UW-Milwaukee, and an AB degree from Barnard College of Columbia University.

Emin Dokumaci
edokumaci@wisc.edu | Phone: (608) 263-4292
Office: 1186B Ed Sciences

Emin Dokumaci is an assistant scientist at the Wisconsin Center for Education Research.  His work is on the identification problem of the effect of schools on students’ achievement levels and their policy implications. In particular, he works on the development of new value-added models. Currently, he and Prof. Robert H. Meyer are working on “A Differential Effects Value-Added Model with Multivariate Shrinkage,” and “Mean and Variance Value-Added Indicators with Multilevel Shrinkage: Application to a Multi-District Statewide Value-Added System.” He works on VARC projects where his expertise in needed. Some of the VARC projects which he is part of are (i) Value Added and Growth Model Demonstration Project, (ii) Milwaukee Classroom Value-Added Initiative, and lately, (iii) An Integrated Qualitative and Quantitative Evaluation of the SAGE Program. In August 2007, Dokumaci received his PhD in Economics from Department of Economics, University of Wisconsin-Madison, where he also served as a teaching assistant for graduate econometrics and graduate microeconomics courses. Prior to joining WCER as an assistant scientist, he worked as a project assistant for research projects on value-added models while pursuing his doctoral studies. His research interests are broad, and as such he has working papers on Economics of Education, Economic Theory, and Applied Theory. He has published in Games and Economic Behavior.

Mary Fish
mjfish@wisc.edu | Phone:  (608) 263-4238
Office: 1152 Educational Sciences

Mary Fish is the administrative assistant for the Value-Added Research Center (VARC) at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. She joined the VARC project on March 1, 2010. Some of her duties include providing support for the director, assistant director and other staff; making travel arrangements; processing expense reports; processing payments to individuals and schools; helping to arrange various meetings; and working with others to update the VARC website.

Nandita Gawade
gawade@wisc.edu | Phone: (608) 263-3386
Office: 1188 Ed Sciences

Nandita Gawade is a researcher at the Wisconsin Center for Education research.  She has worked in the Value Added Research Center since joining WCER in October 2008.  Her work involves developing econometric methods for the estimation of value-added models. Currently, she is working on the development of classroom value-added models for Milwaukee Public School data.  She received her MA in Economics from Princeton University and is currently writing her doctoral dissertation.

Lisa Geraghty
elgeraghty@wisc.edu | Phone: (608) 263-4287
Office: 1179 Ed Sciences

Lisa Geraghty serves as an outreach specialist for VARC. In this capacity, she is part of the design team for professional development work surrounding value-added analysis and part of the development team for a statewide value-added system. In addition, Ms. Geraghty helps coordinate ongoing evaluation projects.

Ms. Geraghty holds a B.A. in Sociology from Kenyon College, a MPA with a focus on Education Policy from the La Follette School of Public Affairs at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, and a MSEd with a focus on Elementary Education from Northwestern University. She worked previously as a school administration consultant for the School Management Services team and the Office of Educational Accountability at the Wisconsin Department of Public Instruction, and as an elementary school teacher in the Verona Area School District.

M. Elizabeth Graue
graue@education.wisc.edu | Phone: (608) 262-7435
Office: 785A Ed Sciences
Website

M. Elizabeth Graue is Professor of Curriculum & Instruction and Associate Director of Faculty, Staff, and Graduate Development at WCER. Her areas of interest include kindergarten policy and practice, class size reduction, home-school relations, and qualitative research methods. She is currently part of a team of WCER researchers exploring the implementation of a data use reform.

Douglas Harris
dnharris3@wisc.edu | Phone: (608) 263-4295
Office: 575K Ed Sciences
Website

Douglas Harris is an economist and Associate Professor of Educational Policy and Public Affairs at the University of Wisconsin at Madison. His research combines advanced economic analysis with practical understanding of schools to examine policies related to teacher quality, standards, accountability, and data-driven decision-making. He is author of the forthcoming book about teacher and school value-added measures from Harvard Education Press (February, 2011). In his current work, he is testing the possibility of estimating value-added for school principals as well as how successful different types of principals are in attracting and retaining high value-added teachers. In 2008, he chaired (with Adam Gamoran and Stephen Raudenbush) the National Conferences on Value-Added with events in Madison and Washington, DC. He presents his work regularly to state and federal policymakers and consults with organizations such as the National Council of States Legislators, National School Boards Association, and the National Board for Professional Teaching Standards. Previously, he was a school board member of the Florida State University School, a K-12 charter school in Tallahassee, FL. His research papers can be found on his home page (www.education.wisc.edu/eps/faculty/harris.asp) as well as www.teacherqualityresearch.org.

Carolyn Heinrich
cheinrich@lafollette.wisc.edu | Phone: (608) 262-5443
Office: 204 Observatory Hill Office Building, 1225 Observatory Dr.
Website

Carolyn Heinrich is the director of the La Follette School of Public Affairs, professor of public affairs and affiliated professor of economics and a Regina Loughlin Scholar. Her research focuses on social welfare policy, public management, and econometric methods for social program evaluation. She also works directly in her research with governments at all levels, including with the federal government in evaluating workforce development programs, the state of Wisconsin on child-support programs, school districts in the evaluation of supplemental educational services, and other governments such as Brazil and South Africa on their social and human capital development programs.

David Heistad
David.Heistad@mpls.k12.mn.us

Dave Heistad is a researcher at the Value-Added Research Center (VARC) at the University of Wisconsin-Madison working on the large scale teacher effectiveness project funded by the Bush Foundation.  He has worked as a program evaluator and researcher in Minneapolis Public Schools for the past 24 years. He is currently the Executive Director of the Research, Evaluation and Assessment in Minneapolis 80% of the time and works for VARC 20%.

Dave has published research in the areas of early childhood assessment, the stability of value-added achievement indicators, and teacher effects in reading. He serves on several federal task forces including the Institute for Education Sciences - Urban Education Research Task Force, American Institute for Research - Evaluation of Restructured Schools Technical Working Group, and the National Center on Response to Interventions - Technical Review Committee and the Federal ARRA Evaluation Advisory Panel. He has a Bachelors Degree in Psychology from St. Olaf College, a Masters in Educational Statistics and a Doctorate in Educational Psychology from the University of Minnesota. Dave was the 2009 recipient of the Council of Great City Schools research leadership award. His current work focuses on the development and implementation of valid and equitable educational accountability and school improvement indicators.

Herb Heneman
hheneman@bus.wisc.edu | Phone: (608) 262-9175
Office: 653d Grainger Hall

Herb Heneman is the Dickson-Bascom Professor (Emeritus) of Management and Human Resources in the School of Business at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.  He also serves as a Senior Research Associate in the Wisconsin Center for Education Research. Herb has been a visiting faculty member at the University of Washington and University of Florida, and was University Distinguished Visiting Professor at The Ohio State University. His research is in the areas of staffing, performance management, union membership growth, work motivation, and compensation systems. For the past decade Herb has been studying the design and effectiveness of compensation, performance management, and strategic human resource systems for teachers and principals in public schools.

Herb also served as the Director of Research for the Society for Human Resource Management Foundation Board.  Herb is the senior author of four textbooks: Managing Personnel and Human Resources: Strategies and Programs (1981), Perspectives on Personnel/Human Resource Management, 3/e (1986), Personnel/Human Resource Management, 4/e (1989), and Staffing Organizations, 6/e (2009). Herb is a Fellow of the Academy of Management, former Chair of its Human Resources Division, and recipient of the Division Career Achievement Award. Herb is also a member and Fellow of the American Psychological Association and the Society for Industrial and Organizational Psychology.  Herb received the Michael R. Losey Research Award from the Society for Human Resource Management for his lifetime of research contributions.

Curtis Jones
cjjones5@wisc.edu | Phone: (608) 265-2621
Office: 1161K Ed Sciences

Curtis Jones is a researcher and evaluator at the Value-Added Research Center (VARC). Curtis holds a M.A. in clinical psychology and a Ph.D. in community and prevention research from the University of Illinois in Chicago. Before joining VARC, Curtis was the director of research and evaluation for Perspectives Charter Schools in Chicago and was the principal evaluator of after-school programs for the Chicago Public Schools. Curtis also has extensive policy research and evaluation experience, having served as the manager of research and evaluation for the Heartland Alliance for Human Needs and Human Rights in Chicago. Curtis's interests include evaluations of Out-of-School-Time (OST) activities, "non-academic" paths for improving students' academic performance, the interrelatedness of poverty, disability, behavior, and student outcomes, and the acculturation process of immigrant students and their families.

Anne Karch
askarch@wisc.edu | Phone (608) 263-7412
Office: 1177 Educational Sciences

Anne Karch is a Project Assistant for Beth Graue in the Value-Added Research Center (VARC) at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. Anne's work for the current project examines how a District level school reform for data-based decision making plays out across all levels of the district (administration, school leaders, teachers and their classrooms).

Anne is a PhD student in Curriculum & Instruction with an interest in Teacher Professional Development and School Reform. A classroom teacher, reading specialist and teacher leader for school based reform, Anne recently returned to graduate school after almost 20 years in the teaching workforce. She holds an MA from Lesley College Graduate School in Teaching Reading and a certificate in Teaching English as a Second Language from UCLA. Her BA is from Harvard, where she majored in Linguistics and Romance Languages.

John Keltz
keltz@wisc.edu | Phone: (608) 265-2076
Office: 1152C Ed Sciences

John works on evaluation projects and value-added modeling as an assistant researcher at VARC. Recent projects have included short-cycle value-added and attendance value-added. John began working at VARC after he received a Master's degree in economics from the University of Wisconsin in 2008. He studied public and labor economics at Wisconsin and received an IES fellowship for education research. John also worked as a research assistant at VARC studying Supplemental Education Services in Milwaukee and the READ 180 program.

Ray Kluender
rkluender@wisc.edu
Office: 1161B Ed Sciences

Ray Kluender is an undergraduate at the University of Wisconsin-Madison majoring in Economics, Mathematics, and Political Science. Joining VARC in May 2010, Ray has worked on student-teacher linkage data analysis and software development. He currently provides data preparation and analysis for a number of projects, primarily working with Los Angeles Unified School District, Atlanta Public Schools, and Tulsa Public Schools. Ray received a Hilldale Fellowship with adviser Robert Meyer to support his Senior Honors Thesis research in teacher quality and district labor policies for the 2011-2012 academic year. After graduating in May 2012, he plans on pursuing a PhD in Economics.

Steven Kimball
skimball@wisc.edu | Phone: (608) 265-6201
Office: 653C Ed Sciences

Steven Kimball is a researcher with the Consortium for Policy Research in Education (CPRE) and the Value-Added Research Center (VARC) at the Wisconsin Center for Education Research (WCER) and the University of Wisconsin-Madison. With VARC, Steve is contributing to the “harvesting” project for the Center on Educator Compensation Reform (CECR) that will collect and distill information from CECR monitors and technical assistance providers about best practices from the Federal Teacher Incentive Fund project.  Steve’s work with the CPRE Teacher Compensation Project has included research on standards-based teacher evaluation and compensation reforms. Steve is also the co-investigator of a study funded by the Institute for Educational Sciences on principal performance evaluation, and is coordinating research on the WCER evaluation of the Chicago Community Trust Education Initiative, which has invested over $55 million in educational interventions in Chicago.  He coordinated the VARC study of literacy coaching in the Milwaukee Public Schools. Steve is also starting research on innovative district human resource practices for the Strategic Management of Human Capital project with CPRE. Before joining CPRE, Steve held legislative analyst positions in the U.S. House of Representatives, the U.S. Senate and the Texas State Office in Washington, D.C.  Steve completed his Ph.D. and M.S. from the U.W.-Madison Department of Educational Leadership and Policy Analysis in 2001.

Sara Kraemer
sbkraeme@wisc.edu | Phone: (608) 265-5624
Office: 1161F Ed Sciences

Sara Kraemer is an assistant researcher in the Value-Added Research Center (VARC) within the Wisconsin Center for Education Research at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. Dr. Kraemer received her Ph.D. in Industrial and Systems Engineering, with a particular emphasis on human factors engineering, at UW-Madison. Dr. Kraemer is currently working in three research projects at VARC. She is a researcher participant in the Chicago Value-Added Project, the Center for Educator Compensation Reform and is also working on a case study evaluation of school improvement planning and processes in Milwaukee Public Schools.

Rachel Lander
rlander@wisc.edu | Phone: (608) 265-2879
Office: 1161L Ed Sciences

Rachel Lander specializes in evaluating literacy programs and interventions in urban school districts. Using mixed-methods, she has researched several literacy programs in Milwaukee Public Schools (MPS), including Literacy Coaches, Direct Instruction, and READ 180, providing both formative and summative evaluations. She is currently leading a study in MPS of two literacy programs for special education students: LANGUAGE! and Unique. Using a contextualized approach, Dr. Lander analyzes how the organization of schools and districts influences the effectiveness of teaching and learning. She is also working on a U.S. Department of Education Investing in Innovation (i3) grant with the Boys & Girls Club and MPS, evaluating the Milwaukee Community Literacy Project. This project intends to increase the reading proficiency of struggling readers in kindergarten through 3rd grade through support in school, community, and family spheres. In addition to MPS, she has done extensive work in Chicago Public Schools and worked in the District of Columbia Public Schools. Dr. Lander also has expertise in qualitative research, strategic planning and logic models. During a multi-year project with the Chicago Community Trust Foundation, she has evaluated program effectiveness and worked with grantees on evaluation quality. She received her PhD from Michigan State University in Educational Policy, Curriculum, and Teacher Education. She began her education career as a middle school teacher in Phoenix, Arizona.

Sean McLaughlin
spmclaughlin@wisc.edu | Phone: (608) 265-2859
Office: 1185 Ed Sciences

Sean McLaughlin is an associate research specialist at the Value-Added Research Center (VARC) at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. He graduated in 2008 with a major in Elementary Education and minor in Physics from UW-Madison. Sean began working at VARC as a student hourly employee in 2006. His initial work involved investigating data warehouse structures for various districts as well as a project to organize and archive the work of VARC Senior Scientist, Robert Meyer.

In 2009, Sean was hired as academic staff as part of the professional development team at VARC. In addition to continued work involving Value-Added data sets, and organization / archival of information, he now works on creating materials to present information on Value-Added to a variety of audiences.

Anthony Milanowski
amilanow@wisc.edu | Phone: (608) 262-9872
Office: 661 Ed Sciences
Website

Anthony Milanowski is an assistant scientist with the Wisconsin Center for Education Research (WCER) at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. He received his PhD in industrial relations from UW-Madison. His recent research has involved human capital management at the school level. He helped to staff the Strategic Management of Human Capital Task Force. He is also currently part of the Center for Educator Compensation Reform technical assistance staff, providing assistance to the U.S. Department of Education Teacher Incentive Fund grantees on teacher and principal performance evaluation. Past work has included coordinating research on teacher compensation and performance evaluation for the Consortium for Policy Research in Education (CPRE) Teacher Compensation Project, developing a process for assessing human resource management program alignment, and studying new teachers responses to incentives. He was also co-Principal Investigator of a study of standards-based principal evaluation systems, including an assessment of the relationship between principal evaluation ratings and value-added student achievement. Before joining WCER, he was a human resource management professional for 16 years, working in compensation, staffing, and performance evaluation.

Ernie Morgan
ernestmorgan@wisc.edu | Phone: (608) 263-3452
Office: 1181 Ed Sciences

Ernie Morgan is a researcher at the Value-Added Research Center (VARC) at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. From 1992 to 1996, Ernie served as an instructor on the Political Science faculty of the University of Wisconsin-Eau Claire, and from 1996 to 1999 as an assistant professor of Economics and Political Science at the College of The Albemarle in Elizabeth City, NC. In 1999, he became the distance education coordinator for the College of The Albemarle. In 2000, Ernie joined the Wisconsin Center for Education Research (WCER) as the Website and Distance Learning Specialist for the Comprehensive Center Region VI (CCVI) project. In 2005, Ernie joined VARC. In his three years with VARC, he has served on a number of projects and currently heads up VARC's Professional Development team. Ernie holds an AB in Political Science and an MA in Economics from the University of Georgia; he is also a PhD candidate in Political Science at UGA.

Hiren Nisar
nisar@wisc.edu | Phone: (608) 262-7283
Office: 1180 Ed Sciences

Hiren Nisar is a project assistant at the Value-Added Research Center (VARC) at the University of Wisconsin-Madison since 2008. He has worked on value added models (VAM) for the Chicago public schools and Milwaukee public schools. His current projects are to evaluate the SES program in Chicago with Carolyn Heinrich and evaluation of charter schools in Milwaukee with Curtis Jones. He is a Ph.D. candidate in the department of Economics at the University of Wisconsin-Madison for which he is working on his dissertation about effects of going to a charter school using Milwaukee public school data. In May 2008, he received his Masters from the University of Wisconsin-Madison in Economics to add to his Masters in Industrial Engineering and Operation research from University of California-Berkeley. Hiren also has a Bachelors in Computer Science from the University of Bombay, India.

Isil Ozturk
eiozturk@wisc.edu | Phone: (608) 890-1270
Office: 1186D Ed Sciences

Isil Ozturk is a Researcher in the Value-Added Research Center (VARC) within the Wisconsin Center for Education Research (WCER) at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. Prior to joining WCER in 2010 as a Researcher, she worked as a Project Assistant for research projects on value-added models. She is involved in multiple research projects at VARC. Her current work with New York City Public Schools has focused on building and estimating teacher value-added models. She received her MS in Economics from University of Wisconsin-Madison and is currently writing her doctoral dissertation.

Qian Peng
qpeng@wisc.edu | Phone: (608) 890-1248
Office: 1180 Ed Sciences

Qian Peng is an Associate Researcher at the Value-Added Research Center (VARC). She obtained her master degree (Statistics) from Michigan State University in 2007. After that, she worked for Fundus Photograph Reading Center (FPRC) on clinic trial studies as a Biostatistician (2008-2010). Her current work focuses on quantitative analysis and value-added modeling at VARC.

Steve Ponisciak
ponisciak@wisc.edu | Phone: (608) 890-2316
Office: 1186F Ed Sciences

Steve Ponisciak is an associate researcher at the Wisconsin Center for Education Research (WCER). He works in the Value Added Research Center at WCER and in the Department of Applied Research at Chicago Public Schools, as the main liaison between CPS and VARC. Prior to joining VARC, he was a senior research analyst at the Consortium on Chicago School Research at the University of Chicago. He analyzed the PSAT, ACT, Explore, and Plan tests; teacher mobility; and value-added models. Steve earned a BS in mathematics from the University of Notre Dame and a PhD from the Institute of Statistics and Decision Sciences at Duke University.

Mikhail Pyatigorsky
pyatigorsky@wisc.edu | Phone: (608) 263-3414
Office: 1186C Ed Sciences

Mikhail Pyatigorsky is a researcher at the Wisconsin Center for Education Research. His work includes developing and implementing program evaluation studies. Currently, he is working on several evaluation projects for the Milwaukee Public Schools. He received his PhD in Economics from Boston University in 2010.

Suzanne Rhodes
serhodes@wisc.edu
Office: 1161B Ed Sciences

Suzanne Rhodes is a PhD student in UW-Madison's Educational Psychology department, Learning Sciences specialization. Prior to attending UW-Madison she managed two IT development and awards programs for faculty at the University of Texas at Austin’s Division of Instructional Innovation and Assessment. Prior to that, she worked as an instructional design lead and project manager for Human Code, an Austin gaming company, and Sapient. She holds a BA in English with a teaching certification and an MA In Curriculum and Instruction, Instructional Technology specialization, from UT Austin. Her current research includes the exploration of how customized formative assessment data collection and visualization tools for handheld devices influence teacher practices and local school data systems to improve teaching and student learning.

Andrew Rice
abrice2@wisc.edu | Phone: (608) 265-2621
Office: 1186F Ed Sciences

Andrew Rice is a researcher at the Value-Added Research Center. Currently he is working on value- added models for Chicago Public Schools and general model development for the center. He received his Ph.D. in Economics from the Pennsylvania State University in 2010 with a focus on Applied Econometrics.

Steve Smith
slsmith27@wisc.edu | Phone: (608) 890-2344
Office: 1152B Ed Sciences

Steve Smith is a researcher at the Value-Added Research Center (VARC). Dr. Smith is currently working on developing Value Added models for the Hillsborough County Public Schools, Denver Public Schools, and The New Teacher Project. Dr. Smith holds a B.A. in Psychology from the University of Virginia, a M.S.E. in School Psychology from the University of Wisconsin-Whitewater, and a Ph.D. in Educational Psychology from the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee. Prior to joining WCER, Dr. Smith was the acting research manager for the Milwaukee Public Schools where he was the lead researcher for the evaluation of the Positive Behavior Interventions and Supports (PBIS) initiative. Dr. Smith also examined the predictive validity and technical adequacy of a variety of curriculum based measures, provided professional development to schools in data based decision making and response to intervention (RtI), and assisted schools in using Value Added data to improve student outcomes. Dr. Smith began his career in education as a school psychologist for the Milwaukee Public Schools, and worked in that capacity for over a decade.

John Snyder
jmsnyder3@wisc.edu | Phone: (608) 890-1248
Office: 1180 Ed Sciences

John is a Quantitative Data Analyst at the Value-Added Research Center.   He is currently working with the Hillsborough County Public Schools to develop a merit-based pay scheme for educators.  Prior to joining VARC, he received a Masters of Science in statistics from Ohio State University in 20010 and a Bachelors degree in Math from Grinnell College in 2005.

Clarissa Steele
crsteele@wisc.edu | Phone: (608) 263-2863
Office: 1161I Ed Sciences

Clarissa Steele is a survey researcher for the Value-Added Research Center. Her current projects include designing and analyzing fidelity of implementation protocols for literacy programs in the Milwaukee Public Schools and researching student-teacher classroom assignments for value-added modeling. Clarissa graduated with an M.S. in Survey Research and Methodology from the University of Nebraska-Lincoln in May 2006. She also holds an M.A. in Spanish from Bowling Green State University, and a B.S. in Business Administration and a B.A. in Spanish and Psychology from the University of Nebraska-Lincoln.

Tim St. Louis
tjstlouis@wisc.edu | Phone: (608) 263-5785
Office: 1161B Educational Sciences

Tim St. Louis is a research assistant in the Value-Added Research Center (VARC) at the University of Wisconsin. Over the course of his professional life, Tim has moved from investment banking to corporate finance to teaching high school math to a Master's degree program (M.Ed.) to his current station. On top of his assistantship duties, Tim is a graduate student in both the Education Policy Studies (EPS) and Public Affairs (LaFollette) departments.

While Tim has lived in and has worked in/with/for the public schools systems of Chicago, Denver, and Seattle, he was raised in the Madison area and attended UW-Madison as an undergraduate. His academic and research interests include enhancing secondary school quality, increasing equitable access to postsecondary education, and assisting low-income students transition to college.

Chris Thorn
cathorn@wisc.edu | Phone: (608) 263-5228
Office: 1161E Ed Sciences
Website

Chris Thorn is an Associate Scientist and Director of the Center for Data Quality and Systems Innovation.. He leads the technical assistance work for the U.S. Department of Education's Teacher Incentive Fund grantees. His work focuses on the links between operational information systems, performance measures, and decision support systems at the state-, district-, and school-levels.

Jenn Vadas
jkvadas@wisc.edu | Phone: (608) 890-1589
Office: 1152C Ed Sciences

Jenn Vadas joined VARC at University of Wisconsin-Madison as a researcher in April 2011. She has since been working on the teacher effectiveness project of the Bush Foundation. This research analyzes the teacher human capital pipeline in order to inform key players on how to efficiently supply high quality teachers for all K-12 children in Minnesota, South Dakota, and North Dakota. Prior to VARC, Jenn Vadas has been working on theoretical and empirical auctions as a PhD candidate in the economics department at the Pennsylvania State University.

Yan Wang
ywang287@wisc.edu | Phone: (608) 262-2063
Office: 1180 Ed Sciences

Yan Wang is a researcher at the Value-Added Research Center. Currently, she is working on state value-added model, which apply value-added model to multiple-district statewide system. She received her Masters degree in Statistics from the Iowa State University in 2010.

Jeff Watson
jgwatson@wisc.edu | Phone: (608) 263-0436
Office: 1161C Ed Sciences

Jeff Watson focuses on how information technology systems support quality and improvement in K-12 education. In his role as researcher at the Value-Added Research Center at WCER he looks at data quality, data warehousing strategies and issues, system integration and development, decision support, data-driven decision making, and quality and improvement for the Integrated Resource Information Systems (IRIS) Project (funded 3/1/08 by IES). He has also implemented data quality studies in Milwaukee and Chicago with an emphasis on assessing the ability of district data systems to provide high-quality student-teacher linkage data. He is also deeply involved with the Bush Foundation's Teacher Effectiveness Project that will provide teacher-level value added metrics to teacher preparation programs in Minnesota, North Dakota, and South Dakota.

Jennifer Winter
jwinter2@wisc.edu |
Office: 1152 Ed Sciences

Jen is an assistant researcher at the Value-Added Research Center, and is currently involved in the Los Angeles, Tulsa, and Atlanta value-added projects. She joined VARC in May 2011 after completing her master's degree in International Public Affairs at UW-Madison, where she focused on quantitative methods for policy analysis and social policy. Prior to finishing her master's, Jen completed her BA in Political Science and French at UW-Madison.

Peter Witham
pwitham@wisc.edu | Phone: (608) 265-2620
Office: 1161D Ed Sciences

Peter Witham joined VARC from Vanderbilt University where he served as a Technical Assistance provider to the 34 school districts receiving Teacher Incentive Fund (TIF) grants. Peter is currently working on three projects at VARC; 1) providing technical assistance through the Center for Educator Compensation Reform (CECR) for Teacher Incentive Fund (TIF) districts, 2) contributing to the CECR “Harvesting Project,” which will collect and analyze documents from TIF Grantees, TA Providers, and Monitors about best practices from the Federal Teacher Incentive Fund Project, 3) collaborating with Milwaukee Public Schools in the design and implementation of a Value Added professional development program for the newly created Cluster Leadership Teams. In May 2007, Peter received his doctorate from Vanderbilt University in educational leadership and policy, for which his dissertation was on Teacher/Principal Data Driven Decision Making in Metro Nashville Public Schools. He taught elementary and middle school for 4 years. Peter holds a M.T.S from Vanderbilt Divinity School in Religious Studies, and a B.A. in History and Spanish from Pepperdine University. 

Robin Worth
raworth@wisc.edu | Phone: (608) 263-1928
Office: 1161J Ed Sciences

Robin Worth is an Assistant Researcher at VARC. Robin received her Ph.D. in Second Language Acquisition from UW-Madison with a focus on classroom research and critical approaches to foreign language learning. At VARC, Robin is working on a multi-district research project investigating the processes used for teacher-student classroom assignment, particularly in relation to Value-Added models. She is also a technical assistance provider for the Teacher Incentive Fund 3 project, a US Department of Education-funded grant project that promotes the development of Performance-Based Compensation Systems in school districts around the country, for which she provides expertise in Strategic Communications and Stakeholder Engagement. Before joining WCER, Robin taught Italian, English as a Second Language, and Applied Linguistics at UW-Madison for 15 years, and also worked in public relations and issues management in the private sector.