California Education Lab

Overview February 24, 2017

CEL Faculty Director Michal Kurlaender speaking

The California Education Lab is a collaborative group of researchers investigating important questions of education policy and practice in California. Much of our work focuses on understanding how young adults are prepared for, transition into, and succeed in college. We also have expertise in K-12 school and teacher quality, college quality, peer effects, educational achievement gaps, school climate, facilities, finance, and school choice. Our projects explicitly aim to understand and improve persistent inequalities in educational attainment for students from different racial/ethnic and socioeconomic backgrounds.

Partnership

In our work, we partner with California educators and policymakers across the K-12 and postsecondary sectors to answer timely and relevant questions with rigorous analytical methods. Our long-standing relationships with the California Department of Education, the California Community College Chancellor’s Office, the California State University Chancellor’s Office, the University of California Office of the President, and the California Student Aid Commission inform and enable our research. Overtime, we have accumulated considerable knowledge about the State’s multiple, and diverse, education sectors, and the data and methods necessary to answer critical policy questions for California.

Dissemination

To ensure the greatest impact on practice and policy, we cooperate with Policy Analysis for California Education (PACE), Wheelhouse: The Center for Community College Leadership and Research, and UC Davis Center for Poverty Research to disseminate our research findings. In addition to academic research conferences and publication in peer-reviewed journals, we disseminate our findings through research and policy briefs, and present at a wide variety of conferences and convenings.

Funding

Our work is supported through federal research grants and the generosity of private foundations.

Institute of Education Sciences, U.S. Department of Education
S.D. Bechtel, Jr. Foundation
The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation
College Futures Foundation
Ford Foundation
The James Irvine Foundation
Policy Analysis for California Education (PACE)
Sobrato Family Foundation
Stuart Foundation
Stupski Family Foundation
Tipping Point Community

COVID-19 Student Survey

Collaborative project with CSAC and the CA Education Lab

Where California High School Students Attend College

Download the research brief

Opportunity for College Readiness in Mathematics

Download the research brief

A Rising Tide: Dual Enrollment is Growing Among California High School Students

Download the research brief

People

Staff Profile May 24, 2016 California Education Lab

Sherrie Reed

Executive Director, California Education Lab

Sherrie Reed serves as Executive Director for California Education Lab. In this role, Sherrie is managing and directing the research efforts of numerous federal and foundation grants and supporting the faculty Principal Investigators. These projects represent unprecedented collaboration among the primary public education segments in the state of California, including formal partnership between the University of California, Davis and the California Department of Education, and collaboration with the California State University Chancellor’s Off

(530) 752-8030

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Faculty Profile December 15, 2009 EMPHASIS AREA: SOEP. Education policy; Educational program evaluation; Educational stratification and equity; K-12 school desegregation

Michal Kurlaender

Chancellor’s Leadership Professor

Michal Kurlaender investigates students’ educational pathways, in particular K-12 and postsecondary alignment, and access to and success in higher education. She has expertise on alternative pathways to college and college readiness at both community colleges and four-year colleges and universities. In addition to working with national data, Kurlaender works closely with administrative data from all three of California’s public higher education sectors—the University of California, the California State University and the California Community College systems.

(530) 752-3748

Graduate Group in Education Faculty February 24, 2017 EMPHASIS AREA: SOEP

Scott Carrell

Professor Emeritus, Department of Economics

Scott Carrell is a Distinguished Professor Emeritus in the UC Davis Economics Department and a Professor of Economics at the University of Texas at Austin. His primary area of research is in the economics of education. Professor Carrell is a Research Associate at the National Bureau of Economic Research, a Research Fellow at Institute for the Study of Labor, and a Faculty Fellow at the Civitas Institute at UT-Austin. He spent 10 years as an active duty officer in the U.S. Air Force, retiring from the U.S. Air Force Reserve as a Lieutenant Colonel in 2015.

Faculty Profile October 2, 2014 EMPHASIS AREA: SOEP

Paco Martorell

Professor and Chair of the Graduate Group in Education

Francisco (Paco) Martorell joined the School as an assistant professor in July 2014. Martorell completed his PhD in economics at UC Berkeley. Prior to joining the School, he was an Economist at the RAND Corporation and was a professor at the Pardee RAND Graduate School since 2006. He has broad research interests in both higher education and K-12 policy. Current projects cover areas including developmental education in colleges, the effects of grade retention, the returns to for-profit colleges, the impacts of school facility investments, and community college tuition subsidies.

(530) 752-3353

pmartorell@ucdavis.edu

Profile February 29, 2024

CASSANDRA M.D. HART

Professor, UC Davis School of Education

Staff Profile March 28, 2024 California Education Lab

Jacob Jackson

Director of Research Partnerships, California Education Lab

jsjackson@ucdavis.edu

Staff Profile March 28, 2024 California Education Lab

Kramer A. Dykeman

Research Fellow/Data Manager, California Education Lab

kakramer@ucdavis.edu

Staff Profile March 19, 2019 California Education Lab

Elizabeth Zeiger Friedmann

Research Fellow, California Education Lab

Betsey Friedmann is a research fellow at Wheelhouse and the California Education Lab. She received her Ph.D. in Education with an emphasis in School Organization and Educational Policy from the University of California, Davis. Her research focuses on issues related to college access and success, including financial aid and transfer pathways from community colleges.

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Staff Profile October 21, 2022 California Education Lab

Kairo Weber

Project Manager, California Education Lab and Wheelhouse

Kairo Weber is the Project Manager for the California Education Lab and Wheelhouse. He assists with research and project coordination across the two centers. Before working for the School of Education, Kairo worked as a peer advisor for the UC Davis sociology department. He is a qualitative researcher with experience doing in-depth interviews and data coding. He completed an undergraduate thesis titled “Gender Confirmation Work, Rest, and Symbolic Boundaries in (Trans)Gender Support Groups” in his areas of expertise, gender and social movements, and won a departmental award for his work.

knweber@ucdavis.edu

Staff Profile November 22, 2023 California Education Lab

Karina Jimenez

Administrative Assistant, California Education Lab and Wheelhouse

Karina Jimenez is the Administrative Assistant for the California Education Lab and Wheelhouse. She assists with research and administrative activities across the two centers. Before working for the School of Education, Karina worked as a Peer Advising Counselor and Special Projects Assistant for the UC Davis Center for Educational Opportunity Program. Karina holds a B.A. degree in History and two minors in English and Latin American and Hemispheric Studies from the University of California, Davis, and graduated with High Honors.

kajimenez@ucdavis.edu

California Education Lab

COVID-19 Student Survey

Where California High School Students Attend College

Opportunity for College Readiness in Mathematics

A Rising Tide: Dual Enrollment is Growing Among California High School Students

Sherrie Reed

Michal Kurlaender

Scott Carrell

Paco Martorell

Jacob Jackson

Kramer A. Dykeman

Elizabeth Zeiger Friedmann

Kairo Weber

Karina Jimenez

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