Our Mission and Work
We work collaboratively with the Detroit education community to design and implement studies that answer questions of critical importance to improving the systems that contribute to the academic, behavioral, and socioemotional outcomes of public school students in Detroit. Our work contributes new knowledge to academic scholarship while also being accessible to and usable by practitioners and policymakers.
Our work is guided by the following principles:
- We engage in equitable work processes internally and externally.
- We have an improvement orientation, working with humility and striving to learn.
- We are committed to the co-creation of research with the Detroit communities we serve.
- We apply rigorous research methods and processes to our work to inform advocacy that is rooted in empiricism.
We began this work as the Detroit Education Research Partnership in 2016 and have grown into a center in the College of Education supported by Wayne State University and external sponsors. We seek to create opportunities for scholars and students across the university and broader academic community to join our collaborative partnerships and gain access to data and study contexts that are necessary to answer questions of critical importance to the Detroit educational and youth development systems.
Learn more about our ongoing projects below. For past research, check out the Research page.
current research focus
Socioeconomic Status, School Enrollment, School Transportation, and Student Attendance Survey of Detroit Families
This study incorporates data from a representative survey of Detroit students’ families in DPSCD neighborhood schools, DPSCD app/exam schools, and Detroit charter schools. By linking survey data on family socioeconomic circumstances (e.g., employment, income, housing, transportation) with student-level administrative data, we are able to explore factors that shape student enrollment and attendance that are typically not observable in administrative data alone.
Lead Researcher Jeremy Singer, Sarah Winchell Lenhoff
Partners Detroit Charters, DPSCD, Every School Day Counts Detroit
Funders Institute of Education Sciences, Skillman Foundation, Spencer Foundation
current research focus
Every School Day Counts Detroit (ESDCD) 4 Pillars Project
This is a mixed methods developmental evaluation of the implementation and effect of a whole-school initiative to reduce chronic absence through the use of wraparound services, communications, technical assistance, and research.
Lead Researcher Danica Brown
Partners Detroit Charters, DPSCD, Every School Day Counts Detroit
Funders Skillman Foundation
current research focus
Housing, Transportation, and Attendance
This is a mixed-methods study on the school enrollment, transportation, and attendance patterns of Detroit families who have experienced eviction or homelessness.
Lead Researcher Jeremy Singer, Sarah Winchell Lenhoff
Partners Detroit Charters, DPSCD
Funders Michigan Department of Education
current research focus
School Access and Transportation in a Time of COVID
This study examines the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on school mobility and enrollment in Detroit and NYC.
Lead Researcher Jeremy Singer, Sarah Winchell Lenhoff
Partners DPSCD, REACH center at Tulane
Funders Institute of Education Sciences
current research focus
Parent Work Schedule and Student Attendance
This study examines how parents’ employment and work schedule are associated with student attendance in school and the probability of being chronically absent. It contributes new knowledge on how workplace polices outside of schools can shape what we typically think of as school outcomes.
Lead Researcher Kess Ballentine
Partners Detroit Charters, DPSCD
Funders Skillman Foundation
current research focus
Accessing Education in Detroit: Neighborhood Safety, School Choice, and Attendance
We will establish new evidence on the neighborhood factors that shape Detroit students’ enrollment and attendance patterns through an innovative qualitative data collection effort that will serve as a baseline for future longitudinal studies and a population-level study on the effect of neighborhood crime and police exposure on student outcomes.
Lead Researcher Yulya Truskinovsky
Partners DPSCD
Funders Wayne State University
current research focus
Participatory Action Research to Reduce Chronic Absenteeism
This is a participatory action research project designed to address chronic absenteeism and its impact on Detroit neighborhoods. With Detroit PEER support, community members have designed and carried out comparative studies to understand youth and educator perspectives on chronic absenteeism. The goal of the project is to support schools with understanding and addressing chronic absenteeism based on youth-centered, contextually specific, and neighborhood-based information.
Lead Researcher Erica B. Edwards
Partners 482Forward, Every School Day Counts Detroit, Urban Neighborhood Initiatives
Funders Spencer Foundation
current research focus
Attendance Agent Networked Improvement Community
This study explores the implementation and effectiveness of a key district strategy for reducing chronic absenteeism: the use of school-based attendance agents and a multi-tiered system of support. We examine the organizational and environmental conditions that shape agents’ work, their conceptual understanding of the problem of absenteeism, their use of improvement methods to learn how to improve their practice, and the alignment of the strategy with the nature of the problem in Detroit.
Lead Researcher Sarah Winchell Lenhoff
Partners DPSCD, Every School Day Counts Detroit
Funders Spencer Foundation
current research focus
Economic and Educational Opportunity in the Context of Neighborhood Change: An Evaluation of the Choice Neighborhoods Initiative in Detroit
This is a mixed-methods longitudinal study of the social, economic, and educational impact of a major community development intervention in Corktown, a mixed-income neighborhood in Detroit.
Lead Researcher Sarah Winchell Lenhoff
Partners City of Detroit, DPSCD
current research focus
The Relationship between Teacher Turnover and Student Attendance
This quantitative study draws from student- and teacher-level data for the tri-county Metro Detroit area to identify the association between teacher turnover and student attendance.
Lead Researcher Ben Pogodzinski
Partners State of Michigan
Funders Skillman Foundation
