The Learning Curve is an essay series that aims to bring new data to timely policy debates by blending academic rigor with accessibility and a focus on solutions. This effort seeks to address policymakers’ needs and make education data actionable and accessible, including by publishing data and code when possible. We hope to bring more data-driven voices into the policy conversation and to broaden and diversify the pool of scholars doing timely, rigorous, and relevant work.
We are seeking proposals for essays that provide early evidence on the effects of local PK–12 and postsecondary education policies and programs, especially those enacted in the wake of the pandemic. Selected authors will receive a $2,500 honorarium and technical and editorial support from Urban Institute staff members to turn their proposal into an essay published on urban.org.
Analyses We’re Seeking
We are looking for analyses of policies and programs that have been implemented at the local level in the past five years in PK–12 or postsecondary education. By local level, we mean jurisdictions that are within states, such as school districts and community college systems. Authors should think of the Learning Curve essay as an early look at the effects of the policy or program, providing available data on outcomes in a timely fashion (authors are free to develop their essays, after publication, into longer products, such as academic journal articles).
Policies and programs can cover any aspect of education, though we are especially interested in those enacted to address the widening of educational inequality that occurred during and in the wake of the pandemic (including those supported by federal Elementary and Secondary School Emergency Relief, or ESSER, funds). Illustrative examples of the kinds of policies and programs we have in mind include the following:
Many school districts implemented high-dosage tutoring programs over the past few years (often using ESSER funds), using various approaches.
The Gwinnett County school district in Georgia used ESSER funds to hire school counselors for its summer programs to improve success in those programs.
Springfield, Massachusetts, began offering free public prekindergarten to all 3- and 4-year-olds in 2022.
Programs at colleges and universities that were seeded by Higher Education Emergency Relief funds and continued through new funding sources, such as a food and housing insecurity program at Fort Lewis College in Colorado and a free textbook program for low-income students at North Carolina A&T State University.
Analyses of these policies and programs should consider whether they accomplished their intended aims (especially in terms of student outcomes) and whether they led to unintended consequences. Ideally, the results will inform future discussions in the place that adopted the policies or programs and other places considering similar policies and programs.
Analyses of existing or proposed education policies that do not fit within this call for proposals can be submitted through the normal process for pitching a Learning Curve essay by email to [email protected].
Audience: This opportunity is open to all policy researchers and analysts with an interest in education, including early-career researchers. Joint proposals are welcome.
Datasets: The proposed analysis may draw on any dataset the researcher has access to, including publicly available datasets and restricted-use datasets from state longitudinal data systems, the federal government, and other sources.
We encourage authors to access national institution-level datasets through the Education Data Portal, which includes most major national datasets on schools, districts, and colleges. PK–12 datasets include the Common Core of Data, the Civil Rights Data Collection, EDFacts, and Urban’s nationally comparable measure of student poverty in schools. Higher education datasets include the Integrated Postsecondary Education Data System, College Scorecard, and Federal Student Aid. Schools and colleges are linked to various geographic identifiers maintained by the National Historical Geographic Information System. A full list of datasets and elements is available at the Education Data Portal’s documentation site.
Authors should expect that the data and code underlying their analysis will be published on the Learning Curve’s GitHub repository. Exceptions to this policy can be granted (e.g., for restricted-access datasets) but should be requested in the proposal.
Process for Selected Proposals
The authors of selected proposals will develop their idea into an essay of 2,000 to 3,000 words and two to four supporting figures or tables.
Authors invited to develop their proposals into essays will receive the support of Urban staff members as they refine their idea, conduct the analysis, and write up their results, including feedback on substance and style. All products will go through Urban’s quality assurance and editorial processes. Authors will own their work, while providing a license to Urban to publish and disseminate it, and will be free to further develop their analyses for publication in other outlets (e.g., academic journals).
Authors will receive a $2,500 honorarium upon publication (divided equally among coauthors).
Proposal Process
The proposal form asks applicants to respond to the following questions:
- What did the policy or program intend to do, when and where was it enacted, and how is an analysis of it relevant to current policy debates?
- What were the policy or program’s goals (as best you can determine), especially in terms of student outcomes?
- What questions will you answer about the policy?
- Which datasets will you use to analyze the policy? Will you be able to share the data and code publicly?
Proposals will be reviewed in two waves, with an initial deadline of Sunday, March 31, 2024, and a final deadline of Friday, May 31, 2024. Review criteria will include the proposal’s originality, feasibility, and relevance to policy.
Authors are welcome to submit multiple proposals.
Questions
Feel free to contact us with any questions at [email protected]