Graduate Fellows

Julia Bloom

Julia Bloom is a fifth-year doctoral student at the Harvard Graduate School of Education. Her concentration is Quantitative Policy Analysis in Education, where she focuses on the effects of No Child Left Behind accountability policies on K-12 education. Her current research interests include teacher labor markets and the interplay between score inflation and school accountability pressures. Prior to returning to Harvard for her doctorate, she was a Statistician at the U.S Department of Education’s National Center for Education Statistics, working specifically on issues related to measuring teacher compensation and teacher dismissals for the Schools and Staffing Survey. Julia has also worked as a Presidential Management Fellow at the U.S. Department of Education’s Strategic Accountability Service and as an Education Program Specialist at the Division of Special Education within the Maryland State Department of Education.  Julia holds a master’s degree in Administration, Planning and Social Policy from Harvard University and a bachelor’s degree in Public Policy from Duke University.

Katie Buckley

Katie Buckley is a fourth-year doctoral student in the Quantitative Policy Analysis in Education concentration at the Harvard Graduate School of Education. Her research focuses on the impact of federal and state policies, specifically teacher quality and school choice policies, on student outcomes. In addition to her work with CEPR, she is also a research associate for the Northeast and Islands Regional Education Laboratory located at the Education Development Center (EDC). Prior to working at EDC, Katie received her M.P.P. from the Georgetown University Institute for Public Policy. During that time, she worked on an evaluation of the Washington D.C. voucher program as well as at the National Center on Education and the Economy.  Katie holds a B.A. in Political Science from Providence College.

Sarah Cohodes

Sarah is a first-year doctoral student in public policy at the Harvard Kennedy School. Her research interests include school choice, teacher effectiveness, and accountability policies. Prior to her doctoral studies, she worked at CEPR for four years, most recently as a Research Manager II. At CEPR, examined the strategic use of teachers in school districts, including extensive work in the Charlotte-Mecklenburg Schools (CMS) and the District of Columbia Public Schools. She led the team that created the human capital diagnostic analyses for the Strategic Data Project and presented the findings to the CMS School Board and public.  She is also coauthor of the Center’s recent report on Massachusetts’ charter schools and leads the Center’s research on charter schools.  Before joining CEPR, she worked as a researcher at the Education Policy Center of the Urban Institute in Washington, DC, where her work focused on the school accountability system in Florida.  Sarah holds a B.A. in economics from Swarthmore College, where she minored in educational policy and English literature, and an Ed.M. education policy and management from the Harvard Graduate School of Education.

Shaun Dougherty

Shaun Dougherty is a fourth-year student concentrating in Quantitative Policy Analysis at the Harvard Graduate School of Education. His areas of research interest include estimating the effects of school- and district-based academic policies on under-performing students, as well as understanding how teacher practice impacts student learning. Prior to coming to Harvard Shaun served a high-school assistant principal and math teacher in suburban Philadelphia where he worked to implement and evaluate school district improvement policies. Shaun holds a B.S. in Mathematics and Economics from the University of Massachusetts-Amherst and a M.A. in Educational Administration from Gwynedd-Mercy College.

Matt Kraft

Matt Kraft is an advanced doctoral student in the Quantitative Policy Analysis program at the Harvard Graduate School of Education.  His research focuses on human capital strategies to improve teacher quality, the relationship between the organizational context of schools and teacher effectiveness, and the measurement properties of classroom observation systems.  His work has appeared in publications such as Teachers College Record, Educational Researcher, and Equity & Excellence in Education.  Before coming to Harvard, he taught middle school English in Oakland and integrated humanities at Berkeley High School where he co-founded and led Life Academy, a small 9th grade academic program for students at-risk of dropping out. Matt holds a B.A. in International Relations and a M.A. in International Comparative Education from Stanford University. More information on his research is available at http://scholar.harvard.edu/mkraft/.

David Liebowitz

David Liebowitz is a fourth-year doctoral student in the Education Policy, Leadership and Instructional Practice concentration at the Harvard Graduate School of Education.  David taught middle school English for six years in Colorado after beginning his career as a content developer and marketing manager at two internet start-ups.  Since starting his graduate studies, David has worked to support classroom teachers in the Boston Public Schools and as a policy analyst at the Massachusetts Executive Office of Education.  Concurrent with his doctoral work, David is pursuing principal licensure.  He hopes to marry his experiences in research, policy, and practice to promote more equitable and excellent systems of schools guided by evidence-based decisions.  David holds a B.A. in English Literature from Columbia University and an Ed.M. in Learning and Teaching from Harvard University.