Michal Kurlaender
Professor and Department Chair
Michal Kurlaender investigates students’ educational pathways, in particular K-12 and postsecondary alignment, and access to and success in higher education. She has expertise on alternative pathways to college and college readiness at both community colleges and four-year colleges and universities. In addition to working with national data, Kurlaender works closely with administrative data from all three of California’s public higher education sectors—the University of California, the California State University and the California Community College systems.
Paco Martorell
Associate Professor
Francisco (Paco) Martorell joined the School as an assistant professor in July 2014. Martorell completed his PhD in economics at UC Berkeley. Prior to joining the School, he was an Economist at the RAND Corporation and was a professor at the Pardee RAND Graduate School since 2006. He has broad research interests in both higher education and K-12 policy. Current projects cover areas including developmental education in colleges, the effects of grade retention, the returns to for-profit colleges, the impacts of school facility investments, and community college tuition subsidies.
Christina E. Murdoch, Ed.D.
Executive Director, Center for Applied Policy in Education (CAP-Ed)
Education is all a matter of building bridges.
—Ralph Ellison, author of Invisible Man
Center for Applied Policy in Education (CAP-Ed)
Christina E. Murdoch serves as Executive Director of the Center for Applied Policy in Education within the UC Davis School of Education. In this role, Christina develops and directs professional learning programs for school district superintendents, principals and teachers including the following:
• Superintendents’ Executive Leadership Forum (SELF)
Gloria M. Rodriguez
Associate Professor
Office hours: Winter and Spring Quarters 2020 — By Appointment Only
Gloria M. Rodriguez’s current research explores notions of educational investment that reflect efforts to build upon community strengths in order to address community needs within and beyond educational settings. Dr. Rodriguez also engages in research that focuses on the political economic conditions and educational trajectories of Chicana/o-Latina/o communities, other communities of color, and low-income populations in the U.S.
Heather Rose
Associate Professor
Office hours: By appointment. Room 125 SOEB.
Research Interests
Economics of education; Education Policy and Governance; Quantitative methods; School finance
