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David Houston

@dmhouston

Assistant Professor of Education Policy | George Mason University | Education Politics, Governance, and Public Opinion

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18.11.2023
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Latest posts by David Houston @dmhouston

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NYC schools chancellor Kamar Samuels taps top deputy, shakes up superintendent oversight Samuels appointed Danielle Giunta the first deputy chancellor of the city’s public schools.

Appointments mirror what has largely been Mamdani’s approach: old hands in NYC governance rather than outsiders or campaign insiders.
@dcbloomfield.bsky.social
@brooklyncollege.bsky.social @thegraduatecenter.bsky.social
By @caylabam.bsky.social @nydailynews.com
www.nydailynews.com/2026/03/05/k...

06.03.2026 12:45 👍 3 🔁 2 💬 0 📌 0
Erased from the permanent record: Data collection practices and non-binary student experiences in school | Education Policy Analysis Archives

New paper w/ @ashleyjcarey.bsky.social looks at how non-binary students are erased in state data sets.

Basic arg is: When we have better data, we are better able to see students who are otherwise erased in the binary. We can also work to make things better for them.

epaa.asu.edu/index.php/ep...

05.03.2026 20:47 👍 3 🔁 2 💬 1 📌 0

I don't think the debate about the future of the Democratic party is between moderates and leftists or between populists and the donor class.

The question is whether the party can field and nominate enough very earnest young people who campaign on "being good and kind to your neighbors."

05.03.2026 18:46 👍 6 🔁 0 💬 0 📌 0

@mattbarnum.bsky.social on one of the most important developments in K-12 ed politics during the last year:

- The dismantling of the U.S. Dept of Ed

AND

- The aggressive use of federal power to shape state and local decision-making, esp. on policies related to race and gender

03.03.2026 23:17 👍 3 🔁 2 💬 0 📌 0

@mattbarnum.bsky.social on one of the most important developments in K-12 ed politics during the last year:

- The dismantling of the U.S. Dept of Ed

AND

- The aggressive use of federal power to shape state and local decision-making, esp. on policies related to race and gender

03.03.2026 23:17 👍 3 🔁 2 💬 0 📌 0
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KAINE: To wage offensive war, the framers of the Constitution were absolutely plain that you gotta come to Congress

KERNEN: But it's almost a moot point

KAINE: Let me just underline the fact that I made an argument about the Constitution and you said it's a 'moot point.' I don't believe that

03.03.2026 14:13 👍 3077 🔁 817 💬 100 📌 56

Congrats to the new board members of the best ed policy research org!!

27.02.2026 20:59 👍 5 🔁 0 💬 1 📌 0

Congratulations to @camarnzen.bsky.social‬ on his appointment as Assistant Professor of Political Science at North Central College! His research examines how education policy & institutions shape democratic participation, governance, & public life. We’re excited to see this work continue.

27.02.2026 19:19 👍 11 🔁 3 💬 0 📌 0

There are some good ideas in here, including things that were already in progress before DOGE cuts. But I don't understand why much of the research workforce had to lose their jobs this past year to implement these changes, and I don't see how some of these changes are possible without researchers.

27.02.2026 20:13 👍 15 🔁 4 💬 0 📌 0

Love this

(Short version: the original finding still holds, but less dramatic after replication with key additional variables accounted for)

27.02.2026 15:29 👍 6 🔁 1 💬 0 📌 0

I'm so unbelievably thrilled with this outcome, Cam! Well earned! Congratulations!

27.02.2026 14:28 👍 2 🔁 0 💬 1 📌 0
The Effects of Teacher Strikes on Compensation, Working Conditions, and Productivity | CALDER Center

Hey, hey, hey, more good stuff (i.e., research!): caldercenter.org/publications...

Want to know more about this? Come see @mimiarnoldlyon.bsky.social present it in person at next Monday's CALDER Conference, register here: docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1F...

23.02.2026 20:35 👍 5 🔁 3 💬 0 📌 0
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Gifted Identification Across the Distribution of Family Income Currently, 6.1 percent of K-12 students in the United States receive gifted education. Using education and IRS data that provide information on students and their family income, we show pronounced dif...

Stunning work:

"Currently, 6.1 percent of K-12 students in the United States receive gifted education ... Under 4 percent of students in the lowest income percentile are identified as gifted, compared with 20 percent of those in the top income percentile."

edworkingpapers.com/ai26-1375

25.02.2026 16:06 👍 223 🔁 55 💬 5 📌 1

Per protocol analysis strikes again!

Folks, if you randomize but then don‘t analyze some of the people who got randomized (maybe because they didn’t adhere to instructions, maybe because they dropped out), randomization will no longer do all the heavy causal inference lifting.

25.02.2026 17:28 👍 190 🔁 56 💬 6 📌 3
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Gifted Identification Across the Distribution of Family Income Currently, 6.1 percent of K-12 students in the United States receive gifted education. Using education and IRS data that provide information on students and their family income, we show pronounced dif...

Stunning work:

"Currently, 6.1 percent of K-12 students in the United States receive gifted education ... Under 4 percent of students in the lowest income percentile are identified as gifted, compared with 20 percent of those in the top income percentile."

edworkingpapers.com/ai26-1375

25.02.2026 16:06 👍 223 🔁 55 💬 5 📌 1
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Most Conservative Students Don’t Feel Persecuted on Campus A new survey of college students contradicts Republican rhetoric that campus culture is hostile to right-wing views.

> 71 percent said their professors create a classroom environment that supports both students who express unpopular opinions and those who may be upset by such views.

Good job everyone. And I mean this sincerely. It is hard out there and we are doing a good job.

24.02.2026 21:45 👍 58 🔁 19 💬 0 📌 3

Brendan & Claude do a version of that recent NYTimes The Daily episode about "What's agentic AI and why does it matter?" specifically for quant education researcher types

Absolutely fascinating/terrifying/exciting

23.02.2026 18:00 👍 2 🔁 1 💬 1 📌 0

Yikes! Be safe!

23.02.2026 02:59 👍 2 🔁 0 💬 0 📌 0

Quick musing from what I've seen recently- If you're looking for job opportunities in the ed policy/research space, I think you should probably be on LinkedIn if you aren't already. I've mostly used Bluesky for research engagement, but feel like more job posts are over on LinkedIn (used to be on X).

21.02.2026 02:47 👍 19 🔁 3 💬 1 📌 0
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Teaching as a team sport: What happens when a great teacher moves to a struggling school? New research on a federal program found that when top teachers transferred to high-need schools, their performance dropped significantly. Teacher effectiveness may not be a fixed skill.

Nice @mattbarnum.bsky.social piece describing an important new study on whether really effective (85th%ile) teachers who have a big change in school context continue to be really effective. They don't: they continue to be effective (66th%ile), but not top tier.

www.chalkbeat.org/2026/02/17/t...

17.02.2026 23:21 👍 15 🔁 10 💬 2 📌 1

No Chicken Left Behind, voucher version:

This is a small sample of chicken-related items Arizona auto-approved for Education Savings Account users.

Arizona has declined to release data showing what funds, if any, have been recouped through auditing.

15.02.2026 17:02 👍 6 🔁 5 💬 0 📌 3
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Postdoctoral Fellow in Economics of Education in Medford, for Tufts University Exciting opportunity in Medford, for Tufts University as a Postdoctoral Fellow in Economics of...

Postdoc posting: Economics of education at Tufts with my colleague Elizabeth Setren.

main.hercjobs.org/jobs/2203818...

11.02.2026 21:20 👍 14 🔁 15 💬 1 📌 2
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New Science Advances paper w/ Jennifer Candipan:

Racial change doesn’t just reshape neighborhoods, it reshapes school punishment. We show Black–White suspension disparities grow in places where Black populations are changing, especially in majority White, suburban, & rural areas.

12.02.2026 23:03 👍 17 🔁 9 💬 1 📌 0

And into the causal inference slide deck you go!

12.02.2026 14:37 👍 13 🔁 2 💬 0 📌 0

Not only do I see this among my students, but I also felt it as a grad student.

Sure, this can go too far. No one wants/needs a 2.5 hour lecture every week.

But there *are* important things to know in our discipline, and one part of a professor's job is to communicate that material clearly.

06.02.2026 14:42 👍 6 🔁 0 💬 1 📌 0
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Child at the podium: “A woo woo woo.”

Mamdani: That’s how I felt when we came up with this plan. Together, we will expand the idea of what is possible in our city—and what sounds and noises we can make at a press conference.

06.02.2026 04:11 👍 42865 🔁 7411 💬 1063 📌 1881

Good advice for faculty too, tbh

05.02.2026 11:56 👍 3 🔁 0 💬 1 📌 0

Awesome work, Jeremy!!

05.02.2026 00:54 👍 1 🔁 0 💬 0 📌 0

I use class-size caps as my go-to topic for teaching about partial equilibrium effects (strong evidence of positive effects for affected students) versus general equilibrium effects (ambiguous; perhaps even negative in a few cases)

I might want to add this example to my teaching toolkit

04.02.2026 15:18 👍 5 🔁 1 💬 1 📌 1
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Opinion | Welcome to the Resistance, Public School Parents

Public schools are one of the most important (and arguably one of the last remaining) sources of community and social cohesion in the modern U.S.

That's why we created them in the 1830's. That's why we need them today.

www.nytimes.com/2026/02/04/o...

04.02.2026 14:43 👍 3 🔁 0 💬 0 📌 0