Blake Heller

Prospective PhD Students:

I am planning to accept a PhD student for AY 2026-27 in the economics and education program at Teachers College. Apply if you want to use the economics of education to study immigration or politics/political engagement and public schools. :-)

Even taking the admin’s justifications @ face value & acknowledging that stronger K12 outcomes might ⬇️ long-run demand for services, millions of adults remain outside that system. Public adult education is central to maintaining a key virtue of US public education, that it is a second-chance system.

Can Marquette join but just for basketball?

Revisiting this question suggests that the landscape of HSE credentialing has meaningfully shifted over the past 30 years, as entry-level jobs have become more likely to require post-secondary training. 4/4

HSE tests like the GED(R) test have introduced new mechanisms to signal college readiness and reward high achievers for prior learning, but institutional adoption has been slow, limiting the utility of earning a college readiness designation for HSE grads. 3/N

HSE grads still lag behind tradition HS grads re: post-secondary enrollment, persistence and graduation, and institutions can do more to support students who arrive via this pathway. 2/N

Excited to see my work on high school equivalency credentials featured by @annenberginstitute.bsky.social. Today’s HSE grads are more likely than ever to use their credentials as an on-ramp back to formal schooling, and those who do earn post-secondary awards at higher rates than past cohorts. 1/N

Go Blue! 〽️〽️〽️ 💪 #NoKings

Re-upping my advice about how to write a good title and abstract for an academic paper, appropriately called:

"How to Write a Title and Abstract"

Feel free to share this thread, which will focus on titles.

#EconSky #AcademicSky

Beyond efficiency arguments for adult ESL (which are compelling), adult education is central to maintaining two of @lkatz42.bsky.social and Goldin’s virtues of U.S. public education: that it’s 1) a second-chance system 2) open to all learners. Don’t throw the baby out with the bathwater.

Instructional Assistant Professor/ Director of Elizabeth D. Rockwell Center - HigherEdJobs Jobs in higher education. Faculty and administrative positions at colleges and universities. Updated daily. Free to job seekers.

The Hobby School of Public Affairs at the University of Houston invites applications for an Instructional Assistant Professor who will serve as Director of the Elizabeth D. Rockwell Center on Ethics and Leadership.

www.higheredjobs.com/details.cfm?...

#PAJobMarket #PAsky #academicsky

More awareness of GED as on-ramp to college needed (opinion) Not enough, probably. Blake H. Heller argues that low awareness limits the potential of what should be a smoother pathway to and through college for high GED test scorers.

Awarding credit for prior learning can help make colleges more welcoming to students who arrive via alternative pathways, but institutions aren’t meeting college-ready GED®️ graduates halfway.

Check out my new op-ed on the GED®️ college readiness designations:

www.insidehighered.com/opinion/view...

Looks like a paper that will change our understanding of charter schools and where they are effective!

Could lower an important barrier to entry—and a handful of methods cover the vast majority of QE studies. Would probably only require 4-6 templates max. Let me know if you are interested:
@tomdee.bsky.social, @eduglaze.bsky.social, @carlyrobinson.bsky.social!

RIDIE is 💯, but has a narrow mission wrt impact evals in LMIC. It could be a fun+worthwhile exercise to put our heads together to design new, better method-specific QED pre-reg templates for a general-purpose registry like OSF. Would make pre-reg docs easier to use for QE research + easier to parse.

imho RIDIE is the only registry that is truly friendly to QED studies—most other registries (I’ll add AsPredicted) allow/accommodate non-expts, but the templates for QE work are either boundlessly open-ended or dominated by experimental language that can make it feel like square peg + round hole.

We're back to post-9/11 rates of anti-immigrant sentiment and the change has happened for all political parties

More fascinating stuff here:

news.gallup.com/poll/647123/...

I have never experienced more consumer surplus than the time I payed the vet tech at Pet Smart $10 to express my dogs leaky anal glands—they basically could have named any price 😂

And re: pre-registration, projects that rely on restricted-use data are usually submitting proposals w/ most of the content of a pre-analysis plan anyway. It’s more about ⬆️ rigor/thoroughness (and frankly, stakes) of this step in the research process than creating new work from whole cloth.

Couldn’t agree more—and data providers, funders, and journals have so much scope to help make #openscience principles the North Star for quasi-experimental work!

Looking forward to a rich discussion re: the scope for #openscience practices to enhance quasi-experimental research with @jenniferdoleac.bsky.social, Anjali Narang, and Maya Duru on Saturday morning at 10:15am at @appam.bsky.social #APPAM2024

perfect timing following @tomdee.bsky.social’s keynote

Integrating Open Science Principles into Quasi-Experimental Social Science Research Quasi-experimental methods are a cornerstone of applied social science, providing critical answers to causal questions that inform policy and practice. Although open science principles have influenced...

🚨New working paper🚨

“Integrating Open Science Principles into Quasi-Experimental Social Science Research” w/ @carlyrobinson.bsky.social

We discuss practical strategies to implement #openscience practices in QE research + how partners can support these efforts. 👇

edworkingpapers.com/ai24-1096

Good morning @appam.bsky.social! We are starting off strong in the Building Human Capital in Underserved Populations session! Thank you to @riacton.bsky.social, @loismiller.bsky.social, @blakeheller.bsky.social, and others for sharing their work! #2024APPAM #APPAM2024 #econsky 📈📉

Kick off #2024APPAM (or is it #APPAM2024?) with us tomorrow morning! @bfelegi.bsky.social @blakeheller.bsky.social @brianholzman.bsky.social and more will be there too 😊

YouTube video by SherylCrowVEVO Sheryl Crow - My Favorite Mistake

m.youtube.com/watch?v=AmIl...

May vote for bond could be difficult for HISD May vote for bond could be difficult for HISD

White paper: uh.edu/hobby/cpp//w...

Coverage: eedition.houstonchronicle.com/infinity/art...

In our experiment, Texans who received info re: ⬆️ student proficiency rates in NES schools:

+20pp support the TEA takeover of HISD

+ 36pp agree that the NES reforms are good for students

+ 10pp support the $4.4b bond

+ 0.5sd overall opinion of the takeover AND takeover process (🤯)

Excited to see my recent work (w/@SaraRSands) covered in @meganmenchaca.bsky.social’s excellent piece on HISD’s failed $4.4b bond proposal.

The Miles admin has a lot of work ahead of them to earn voters’ trust. Our survey expt suggests that messaging student growth in NES schools is persuasive 👇

Here's my attempt to start gathering names of folks who write about education policy, including journalists, who are critical the ensuring research has a policy impact.

go.bsky.app/3XhYmo3

This is a great public service—plz add me to the party 🥳