Four from UW–Madison ranked among most influential education scholars for 2021

Education Week blogger Rick Hess published his annual rankings of the top 200 most influential education scholars in the United States recently, and once again several faculty members with ties to UW–Madison and its School of Education are on the list.

Ladson-Billings (clockwise, from top left), Gamoran, Baldridge, and Jackson

UW–Madison’s Gloria Ladson-Billings is up to No. 2 this year, while Adam Gamoran is No. 123, Jerlando Jackson is No. 178, and Bianca Baldridge is No. 198.

These annual public influence rankings appear each January in Education Week’s “Straight Up” blog, which is authored by Hess.

Ladson-Billings is a professor emerita and the former Kellner Family Distinguished Professor of Urban Education in the Department of Curriculum and Instruction, while Gamoran is the John D. MacArthur Professor Emeritus of Sociology and Educational Policy Studies, and the former director of the Wisconsin Center for Education Research. Ladson-Billings is the president of the National Academy of Education and Gamoran now serves as president of the William T. Grant Foundation in New York City.

Jackson is a Vilas Distinguished Professor of Higher Education and chair of the Department of Educational Leadership and Policy Analysis, and the director and chief research scientist of Wisconsin’s Equity and Inclusion Laboratory (Wei LAB). Baldridge is an associate professor in the Department of Educational Policy Studies.

Hess explained the purpose of the rankings is to spotlight scholars “who did the most last year to shape educational practice and policy.”

“Simply being included in this list of 200 scholars is an accomplishment,” he said, “given the 20,000 or more who might qualify.”

Each scholar was scored in nine categories — Google Scholar score, book points, highest Amazon ranking, education press, web mentions, newspaper mentions, Congressional record, syllabus points, and Twitter score.

To learn more, check out Hess’ Straight Up blog post about this year’s rankings.