A widely respected scholar in the field of education research, professor David Figlio was recently honored with the Outstanding Service Award of the American Education Finance Association (AEFA). The award was presented on March 20 at the organization's 2010 conference, focusing on "Education Finance and Policy in a Time of Fiscal Constraints and Federal Action."
The American Education Finance Association is a nonprofit professional and academic association dedicated to promoting understanding of the means by which resources are generated, distributed and used to enhance human learning. The association encourages rigorous research related to education finance and policy.
The organization's Outstanding Service Award recognizes contributions made to public policy development, research, public understanding, local school finance development and service to the AEFA. This year, Figlio shares the award with David Monk, professor of education at Pennsylvania State University and his fellow founding editor of the AEFA's official journal, Education Finance and Policy. Since 2005 when the journal was established, Figlio and Monk have fashioned it into a widely recognized source for high-quality, policy-relevant research.
Figlio is the Orrington Lunt Professor of Education and Social Policy at the School of Education and Social Policy and a fellow at the Institute for Policy Research at Northwestern University, as well as a research associate at the National Bureau of Economic Research. His research on education and social policy, including influential work on school accountability, standards, welfare policy and policy design, has been published in numerous leading journals and funded by major public and private grantors. He has served on many national education task forces and panels, and has advised several U.S. states and nations on five continents on the design, implementation and evaluation of education policy.