There is a well-known gap between research and practice. While there are investments in some strategies to address this gap, they are often not drawing from the existing research on how to improve research use. This article shares what we understand about the many ways research is used in education, why educators may use research, and under what…

This case study examined how research has been used in the federal higher education rulemaking process, through which the U.S. Department of Education implements programs under the Higher Education Act. Findings indicate that in this high-conflict policymaking process, politics infuses various forms of research use to create several overlapping…

A key concern in international educational policy during the 21st century has been the impact of teacher professionalism on outcomes of schooling. Sweden makes for an interesting case because of the country's initiatives to improve the quality of education through an academization of the teachers. The aim of this study is to analyse how Swedish…

Models of research use in education tend to focus on specific elements of education systems or underplay the complexity of system change. Within other public policy areas, notably health, more work has been undertaken to integrate systems thinking when considering knowledge mobilisation and research use. In this paper, we survey public policy…

This research focuses on how members of the UK Parliament engaged with evidence in relation to the policy decision leading to the Selective Schools Expansion Fund, a policy designed to enable the existing 163 English grammar schools to apply for additional funds to expand their intake. Although a small case study, the narrow focus provides a…

The primary justification for school voucher programs in the United States has revolved around questions of efficacy, especially relative to student achievement outcomes. More recently, however, a series of studies revealed sizable negative impacts on students enrolled in voucher programs. Collectively, these studies presented an evidentiary…

In education, reform and renewal are constant. Policies are continually changing to meet the needs of the times and the society. Political advisors, such as the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development, play an important role among private consultants as policy actors. According to Gunter's (in: Howlett and Mukerjee (eds), Handbook of…

Recognizing the need for scientific fidelity and balanced representation in the evidence that informs public policy, this study investigates technical and issue bias in 43 policy briefs and state handbooks that provided information about the use of Student Learning Objectives to evaluate teachers' performance. The author uses multiple qualitative…

For stakeholders who would like to see more research as a basis for educational policy, it is important to understand the prevalence of research use and the sources of the studies used by policymakers, as well as the factors that hinder research use in educational policymaking. Through an analysis of regulatory documents and interviews with 34 key…

Social scientists' involvement with the legal system is critical for tackling inequities in education and informing legal developments in ways that are grounded in empirical realities that document the myriad ways race shapes educational opportunity and outcomes. This study examined the experiences of social scientists who have participated in…

In some countries it is common for policy makers to advocate research use by practitioners as a means to bring about school development. Yet, despite their increasing sophistication, the enactment of protocols for using research is problematic and, even in optimal environments, practitioners have difficulty mobilising research findings to improve…

In the 1970s, the role of "chief scientist" was established in Israel as part of a knowledge mediation model aimed to promote research-informed policy and narrow the academia-field-policy gap. This paper examines how when researchers cross the boundary toward a policy role and serve as knowledge brokers, they may promote research…

This chapter calls for researchers to reconceptualize research quality from the perspective of its expected use, attending to power dynamics that influence how knowledge is defined, constructed, and validated through the research enterprise. Addressing these concerns when designing and conducting education research can yield more useful research…

Using congressional testimony on teacher quality from 2003 to 2015 and analysis of 60 elite interviews, we show how the political economy of knowledge production influences idea uptake in education policy discourse. We develop and assess a conceptual framework showing the organizational and financial infrastructure that links research, ideas, and…

Although interest in ESE policy studies is on the rise, we argue there is a gap in scholarship about the nature and extent of interactions between policymakers and researchers in the ESE field. This paper addresses this gap by discussing one example of such interaction -- an ongoing research-practice partnership (RPP) between the New York City…