Jon Valant

Jon Valant is the director of the Brown Center on Education Policy, a senior fellow in Governance Studies, and holds the Herman and George R. Brown Chair in education studies at Brookings. He specializes in pre-K–12 education policy and politics. Much of his research examines inequities in U.S. schools and the policies that mitigate or exacerbate those inequities. This includes work on topics such as school choice, student discipline, and the barriers that keep families from accessing opportunities.

He also studies the politics of education, examining issues related to public opinion, partisan politics, and the goals of public education. At Brookings, Valant also co-edits the Brown Center Chalkboard blog, which aims to improve the research and information available to decision-makers in education. In addition, he works with local and state policymakers through research-practice partnerships in New Orleans and Washington, D.C., and has virtually taught a graduate-level education policy course at Stanford University.

His research has been published in a wide assortment of academic and other outlets. Valant serves on the board of directors of the Association for Education Finance and Policy and the editorial boards of Educational Researcher and Educational Evaluation and Policy Analysis. His research and commentary have appeared in outlets such as The New York Times, The Economist, PBS NewsHour, and NPR.

Valant holds a Ph.D. in educational policy and a master’s degree in political science from Stanford University, a master’s in public policy from Harvard University, and a bachelor’s degree in philosophy and political science from the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor.