Eric Hanushek
Paul and Jean Hanna Senior Fellow in Education
member of the K–12 Education Task Force

Expertise: Economics of education; applied public finance and public policy analysis, with special emphasis on education issues

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Eric Hanushek is the Paul and Jean Hanna Senior Fellow and a member of the Koret Task Force on K–12 Education. A leader in the development of the economic analysis of educational issues, his research spans the impact on achievement of teacher quality, high-stakes accountability, and class-size reduction. He pioneered measuring teacher quality on the basis of student achievement, the foundation for current research into the value-added evaluations of teachers and schools. His work on school efficiency is central to debates about school finance adequacy and equity; his analyses of the economic impact of school outcomes motivate both national and international educational policy design.

Hanushek is also chairman of the Executive Committee for the Texas Schools Project at the University of Texas at Dallas and a research associate of the National Bureau of Economic Research. He currently serves as chair of the Board of Directors of the National Board for Education Sciences.

His recent book, Schoolhouses, Courthouses, and Statehouses: Solving the Funding-Achievement Puzzle in America's Public Schools, describes how improved school finance policies can be used to meet our achievement goals. Earlier books include Courting Failure, the Handbook on the Economics of Education, The Economics of Schooling and School Quality, Improving America’s Schools, Making Schools Work, Educational Performance of the Poor, and Education and Race, along with numerous widely cited articles in professional journals.

Hanushek previously held academic appointments at the University of Rochester, Yale University, and the U.S. Air Force Academy. He served in government as deputy director of the Congressional Budget Office. He has been appointed to a variety of policy commissions including the Governor’s Committee on Education Excellence in California. He is a member of the National Academy of Education and the International Academy of Education along with being a fellow of the Society of Labor Economists and the American Education Research Association. He was awarded the Fordham Prize for Distinguished Scholarship in 2004.

A distinguished graduate of the United States Air Force Academy, he completed his Ph.D. in economics at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. He served in the U.S. Air Force from 1965 to 1974.