Education | Penn IUR

Announcement February 26, 2025 Photo Contest | Gather: The Power of Place-based Connection The Penn Institute for Urban Research invites photographers and visual storytellers worldwide to participate in our ninth annual photo contest, Gather: The Power of Place-based Connection. Urban Development

Article December 9, 2024 Laura Perna on Access to Higher Education Among the nation's leading scholars on issues of college access and affordability, Laura Perna has advanced the discourse on equity in higher education through numerous highly acclaimed edited volumes, reports, and articles. Her scholarship examines the policy choices for enabling access—and success—for post-K-12 education, assessing college access, affordability, and success--especially for low-income, first-generation, and non-traditional students. Laura Perna Urban Development

Feb 27 2025 Past Event PhD Lunch & Lightning Talks Urban Development

Faculty Fellow Katharine Strunk

Dean, and George and Diane Weiss Professor of Education, Graduate School of Education

State & Local Finance Anchor Institutions

Faculty Fellow Emily Hannum

Professor of Sociology and Education and Associate Dean, School of Arts & Sciences

Climate Change & Resilience

Affiliated PhD Student Sharicca Boldon

MidCareer Doctoral Educational Program in Educational and Organizational Leadership

Urban Development Anchor Institutions

Urban Leadership Fellow Alicia Augustin

Anchor Institutions

Urban Leadership Fellow Faith Applegate

Anchor Institutions

People Janet Currie

Henry Putnam Professor of Economics and Public Affairs, Princeton University Co-Director, Center for Health and Wellbeing

Climate Change & Resilience Housing

Student Program August 22, 2024 Penn IUR Fellows in Urban Leadership Urban Development

Article February 16, 2022 Getting the Education and Workforce Training Our Nation Needs Penn IUR Faculty Fellow Laura W. Perna discusses the broad potential impacts of federally funded tuition-free community colleges in the United States. Laura Perna Anchor Institutions

Oct 12 2021 Past Event Community College: Who Should Pay?

Publication May 19, 2021 Confronting the System: How Local Cross-Sector Education Collaborations Address Barriers to Postsecondary Access & Attainment Anchor Institutions

Scholar Stefanie DeLuca

James Coleman Professor of Social Policy and Sociology, Johns Hopkins University Director of the Poverty and Inequality Research Lab at Johns Hopkins University. Research Principal at Opportunity Insights at Harvard University

Publication May 18, 2020 Brothers in Grief: The Stages of Grieving for a School and its Students Following Three Shooting Deaths of Black Teenage Boys During my two years of ethnographic research in an all-boys, all-Black Philadelphia high school, three students died in separate incidents of community gun violence, impacting dozens of their friends and classmates and the entire school community.

Publication April 17, 2020 Access to Quality Higher Education My research examines the ways that social structures, educational practices, and public policies promote and limit college access and success, particularly for low-income, first-generation, and non-traditional students. As the novel coronavirus triggers sweeping changes to the delivery of higher education, I will be keeping a close eye on two evolving and interrelated issues in particular: the role of technology in supporting student success, and the characteristics of learners who do—and do not—have access to high-quality higher education. Laura Perna Anchor Institutions

Faculty Fellow Pam Grossman

Professor of Education Learning, Teaching, and Literacies Division, University of Pennsylvania, Graduate School of Education

Affiliated PhD Student Wichinpong “Park” Sinchaisri

PhD Candidate in Operations, Information, and Decisions, School of Management, The Wharton School

Article March 9, 2017 Improving the Evidence Base for Access to Quality Pre-K Early childhood education has captured the nation’s attention and holds a rare spot in the center of the political aisle. This is not surprising given that a quality Pre-K experience can save the public at least three dollars for every dollar spent, particularly for children who live in poverty and experience numerous risks to their educational success. In Philadelphia, the poorest of the ten largest cities in America, Mayor Kenney established the Commission on Universal Pre-K to expand access to quality Pre-K in the city, with the ultimate goal of universal access for all three- and four-year-old children. This introduced one of the most important decisions in Kenney’s early term as Mayor—how to expand quality Pre-K given limited funds and thousands of children in need. As researchers, the critical question for us became how to provide useful information to Kenney’s Commission in a timely manner so they can allocate funds to serve the most vulnerable children first. Anchor Institutions

Article September 13, 2016 Lessons Learned for Transforming Urban Public Education Over the past 15 years, new education policies have led to a host of reforms throughout the country, spanning everything from standardized accountability testing and class size reduction to school choice and merit pay, to name just a few. Which of these reforms have actually worked to improve the lives of students in the nation’s urban schools—and which have failed to live up to expectations despite the best of intentions? Matthew Steinberg Anchor Institutions

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