Mission
Accelerate improvement in the quality of and equity in educational experiences for K-20 students.
Accelerate improvement in the quality of and equity in educational experiences for K-20 students.
Strengthen decision-making by education leaders, practitioners, and policy makers through the use of evaluative inquiry, field knowledge, and improvement science approaches.
Jennifer Iriti is the Assistant Vice Chancellor for Research Inclusion and Outreach Strategy and a Research Scientist at the Learning Research and Development Center at the University of Pittsburgh. Her work focuses on supporting educational practitioners and decision-makers in using research, data, improvement methodologies, equity frameworks, and human-centered design to strengthen the quality of their work and accelerate achievement of their goals. Much of her recent work is centered on designing and evaluating collective impact efforts to increase equitable access to postsecondary education including evaluation of the Pittsburgh Promise, analysis of best practices across Promise programs nationally, the establishment of a new network of precollege STEM programs and building an evaluation plan for the Northern California College Promise Coalition. She has been providing evaluation and program development expertise for education-related organizations for over 20 years. Iriti specializes in applying improvement science, utilization-focused evaluation and developmental evaluation to support education systems improvement. She has authored numerous published journal articles, technical reports and book chapters including the recently released "The Free College Handbook: A Practitioner's Guide to Promise Research."
Brooke English (she/her) is a Research and Evaluation Specialist with the Evaluation for Learning team at the University of Pittsburgh's Learning Research and Development Center. She uses mixed methods and community-engaged research to address challenges within marginalized communities. Her current work helps support the EFL's projects with the Pittsburgh Promise and its Coaching Initiative, the STEM PUSH Network, and the Northern California College Promise Coalition. In past work, she has collaborated with the Texas Transgender Non-Discrimination Summit and Houston-area community colleges to assess the efficacy of anti-discrimination policies at their campuses. She holds a Master's in Linguistics from the University of California - Santa Barbara and a Bachelor's in Cognitive Science and the Study of Women, Gender, and Sexuality from Rice University. Her Master's thesis is titled "r/TransVoice: Emotions and Community-Based Voice Training." Outside of work, she loves to watch Jeopardy! and do crosswords.
Danielle is a post-doctoral researcher at the Learning Research and Development Center (LRDC) at the University of Pittsburgh. As part of the Evaluation for Learning group at LRDC, she works as part of a team that uses mixed methods approaches to provide evidence-based support to strengthen decision-making by education leaders, practitioners, and policy makers. Additionally, she is involved in Partners for Network Improvement (PNI) where she currently contributes to the knowledge management team for the STEM PUSH Network. STEM PUSH is a networked improvement community which aims to broaden the participation of minoritized students in STEM fields. Danielle earned her doctoral degree in education administration and policy studies from the University of Pittsburgh, where she focused her studies on education policy and causal inference methods. She also holds a Master's in Public Administration from Ohio State University. Danielle's research primarily focuses on higher education financial aid policies and college access and success programs, with a particular emphasis on how these policies and programs affect the educational outcomes of students from underserved backgrounds.
Talia Stol is a Research Associate at the University of Pittsburgh's Learning Research and Development Center, where she is a member of the Evaluation for Learning and Partners for Network Improvement teams. Her current work is primarily on the STEM PUSH Network, an NSF-funded INCLUDES Alliance focused on racial equity in STEM. Dr. Stol specializes in responsive, use-oriented and developmental evaluation approaches, drawing on expertise in qualitative research methods, the learning sciences, and critical theories of education to facilitate reflective practice and support organizational growth and improvement. Her professional experience spans educational contexts including early childhood, K-12 schooling, out-of-school time learning environments, and teacher education and professional development. She holds a doctoral degree in social research methodology and a master's degree in social sciences and comparative education from the UCLA Graduate School of Education and Information Studies.
Lindsay Page is an assistant professor of research methodology at the University of Pittsburgh School of Education, a research scientist at Pitt's Learning Research and Development Center, and a faculty research fellow of the National Bureau of Economic Research. Her work focuses on quantitative methods and their application to questions regarding the effectiveness of educational policies and programs across the pre-school to postsecondary spectrum. Much of her recent work has involved the implementation of large-scale randomized trials to investigate innovative strategies for improving students' transition to and through college. She holds a doctorate in quantitative policy analysis and master's degrees in statistics and in education policy from Harvard University. She earned her bachelor's degree from Dartmouth College.
Jennifer Zoltners Sherer is a Research Associate at the University of Pittsburgh's Learning Research & Development Center and a member of the Partners for Network Improvement team. Her work includes the developmental evaluation of networks, offering evidence-based support of network leaders as they design, initiate, and develop networks that improve K-12 teaching and learning. Her research interests focus on distributed leadership, organizational change, and improving teaching and learning in K-20 systems through networks, tool design and implementation, professional development, and curriculum. She was an Instructional Design Fellow at The Institute for Learning. In addition to designing tools and learning environments, she supported the IFL's data and evaluation process. She co-designed and co-taught the IFL's Coursera course: Accountable Talk: Conversation that Works and co-developed the Process Engineering for Educational Results (PEER) project. Prior to receiving her Ph.D. in Learning Sciences from Northwestern University, she was a teacher in Oregon.