It’s official: The House Education and Workforce Committee is going to take up discussion of reauthorizing the Education Sciences Reform Act next Tuesday, Sept. 10.
During the hearing, “Education Research: Exploring Opportunities to Strengthen the Institute of Education Sciences,” the committee said it planned to “to discuss ways to improve the quality, timeliness, and usefulness of education research.”
The following speakers will testify:
• George A. Scott, director for education, workforce, and income security issues at the U.S. Government Accountability Office
• Bridget Terry Long, an education and economics professor and academic dean at Harvard Graduate School of Education, as well as chairman of the National Board for Education Sciences, the advisory panel for IES.
• James Kemple, the executive director of the Research Alliance for New York City Schools, at New York University
• Kathy Christie, vice president for knowledge and information management and dissemination at the Denver, Colo.-based Education Commission of the States
It’s interesting that the preliminary guest list doesn’t include IES Director John Easton, and the lineup may suggest a committee focus on the agency-local research partnerships that have become a big driver in IES in the last few years. It remains to be seen whether this will generate enough buzz to make lawmakers interested in a bill, or if it will be another year before Congress takes up education research.